Is lack of sleep taking its toll on children?

As experts call for sleep lessons in school and a

head teacher gives his pupils a lie-in, we look at
why bedtimes matter
How many hours of sleep does a five-year-old need? Does the time
at which a child sleeps matter? What hormones are produced only
during sleep? If, as a parent, you don’t know the answers, you are
not alone. According to a new survey by the Sleep Council, most
parents cannot answer these or even more basic questions about
children’s sleep. Neither can most GPs, health visitors or teachers —
and children are paying the price in health problems.
Mandy Gurney, an expert on children’s sleep, says that an
increasing number of children spend their formative years
“chronically sleep-deprived”. As a result they are not only tired,
ratty and inattentive but are more prone to a spectrum of health
problems including obesity, hypertension and clinical depression.
Gurney has been asked to set up a sleep clinic by a North London
health authority because it recognises that simply getting children
to sleep better will produce huge cost savings in health treatments
over their lifetimes.
Why is the problem not more widely recognised? Because sleep is
seen as something that we “just do”, says Gurney. “It is seen as
organic rather than a medical issue, and people looking after
children don’t connect the chronic and often serious symptoms with
simple lack of sleep. Children are even less likely to see the
connection.”
Which is why the Sleep Council is calling for sleep to be
taught in schools.
Kathleen McGrath, a paediatric nurse who has written the
council’s new Good-night Guide for Children booklet, says that
attention, memory and learning are some of the first casualties of
sleep shortage, so schools have a vested interest in getting children
to take their sleep more seriously.
“Sleep deficiency impacts strongly on the prefrontal cortex of the
brain,” she says. “This is the area engaged in what you might call
higher-order thinking, involving creative and conceptual processes,
as well as short-term memory.”
The recent changing of the clocks produced its annual reminder of
just how sensitive our minds are to even a little sleep deprivation.
According to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, the
accident rate on the road and at work rose again significantly, if
briefly, after our loss of that one autumnal hour.
Children are more susceptible to minor changes than adults, says
McGrath: “They get clumsier, slower and less responsive.” The
effect is more noticeable nowadays because they are already
drawing on a low “sleep tank” as 24-hour television and social
media cut into night-time routines.
The problem is insidious because, as children have started sleeping
less, parents have shifted their expectations and many do not
appreciate how much sleep children need. A five-year-old, for
example, needs 11 hours but many children of that age get far less.
The effect becomes apparent in the classroom and beyond — but
not always in obvious ways.
Amara Willis was 5 when her sleep started to become disrupted. She
had been sleeping through the night since she was 2, then stopped.
Her daytime behaviour became aggressive and troubled and she
started complaining about a catalogue of problems, from a blocked
nose at night to blotches in front of her eyes that she said “turned
into monsters”. The family GP referred her to the mental health
services, who diagnosed an anxiety disorder and sent her mother on
a positive parenting course. She was also sent to an ear, nose and
throat specialist for the nocturnal catarrh, and her school was
informed of her “psychiatric problem”.
She was then referred to Millpond Sleep Clinic, which Gurney runs.
Within weeks her sleep pattern settled and all the diagnosed
problems disappeared.
Amara, who turns 7 next month, now sleeps for the requisite 10
hours a night and is “confident, happy, sociable and doing well at
school”, says Susan, her mother. “Learning to sleep has
transformed her, but I don’t think it ever occurred to the mental
health team that a few sessions in a sleep clinic could achieve that.”
Susan Willis, a 40-year-old bookkeeper, strongly supports the idea
of teaching children about sleep. “After all,” she says, “schools now
teach them about diet and sex but not about something that they
spend a third of their lives doing.”
Older children are probably in even more need of sleep education,
says Russell Foster, professor of circadian neuroscience at
Brasenose College, Oxford, because they are subject to fewer
parental controls and inclined to go to bed only when they have to.
Add to that ever-present screens and mobile phones in their lives
and sleep time is cut brutally short.
“In the Sixties and Seventies teenagers were getting what they
need — nine to nine-and-a-half hours of sleep a night,” says
Professor Foster. “That is now more like seven to seven-and-a-half.”
It is not only the duration of sleep that matters but the timing and
type. Teenagers, like babies and toddlers, need a lot of “slow-wave”
sleep, and tend to need more morning sleep for optimal functioning.
After hearing about experiments with later school start times in the
US, Monkseaton High School in Whitley Bay, Tyneside, has instituted
a 10am start to the day for its older pupils. Paul Kelley, the head
teacher, became interested when he learnt about the “two-hour
shift” in teenagers which means that their biological sleep cues,
from melatonin levels to body temperature, come a couple of hours
after those of young children and adults.
Although it is too early to predict results, Kelley says that the omens
are good. “The children say that they prefer it — and they do seem
brighter when they arrive.” Alertness peaks in the early afternoon
for the average teenager (though unfortunately not for teachers)
and in the late evening (in contrast to parents).
Lack of awareness of the distinct sleep patterns and needs of
teenagers can lead to them being not only misjudged but
misdiagnosed. Anthony Pantello was almost 13 when his mother
decided that his sleep problem needed tackling. His GP said that he
couldn’t help. Anthony’s problem was compounded slightly by the
fact that he has suffered from mild Tourette’s, ADHD and anxiety
since his father and two other close relatives died in quick
succession.
“He had difficulty in settling into school, problems with
concentrating and his behaviour was often loud and impatient,”
says his mother Caroline, a legal secretary. She was “surprised and
relieved” to find a sleep clinic that dealt with older children.
Children and teenagers with special needs often suffer from sleep
problems that make their underlying troubles worse, and sleep
therapy can often help.
“Anthony now sleeps really well and has completely changed,” says
Caroline. “He is doing much better at school and any perception of
him as a ‘special case’ has gone.”
With 30 per cent of children suffering from sleep problems and the
evidence on associated medical conditions accruing, the prospects
do not look favourable, says Professor Foster. “The good news is
that if emerging problems are treated in childhood they invariably
resolve.” If, conversely, they are not addressed, there is every
chance that they will continue for life. That is something for parents
to sleep on.