Sleep and caregiver burden among caregivers of persons living with dementia: A scoping review

Caregivers of persons with dementia report worse sleep when compared to the general population. The objective of this review was to synthesize evidence regarding the link between caregiver burden and dementia caregivers’ sleep. We conducted a scoping review using a systematic search for pertinent literature in PubMed, CINAHL, and Web of Science through March 2022. Keywords included content areas of dementia, caregiver burden, and sleep. Inclusion criteria were informal caregivers of persons living with dementia, a measured relationship between informal dementia caregiver sleep and subjective caregiver burden variables, and original research. Non-English studies were excluded. Extracted data were organized in tables, compared, and synthesized. The search yielded 540 non-duplicate articles screened by title and abstract; 118 full-text articles were reviewed; 24 were included. Most studies were cross-sectional, with variable sample sizes. Dementia caregivers had significantly poorer overall perceived sleep than non-caregivers across four studies that examined self-reported sleep measures. Eighteen studies investigated the association between caregiver burden and self-reported sleep quality, with 14 reporting a significant positive association between caregiver burden, and four found null results. Only two of the four studies reporting the association between caregiver burden and objective sleep parameters (i.e., actigraphy and polysomnography) reported a significant positive association for at least one sleep subdomain. While subjective sleep quality is commonly impacted by dementia caregiving burden, there is a lack of corresponding evidence on the relationship between burden and objective sleep metrics. Healthcare providers should consider the dementia caregiver burden’s impact on sleep and regularly assess caregivers' sleep difficulties. Future studies should focus on consistently measuring caregiver burden and sleep to promote dementia caregiver health and well-being.