Sleep duration and suicidal behavior: A systematic review

Abstract

Introduction

Suicide is a serious public health problem, being the second leading cause of death among 15–29-year-olds. Many risk factors have been associated with suicidal behavior, such as psychiatric disorders, family history of suicide, loss of a close friend/relative, physical/sexual abuse, lack of support network, or sleep disturbances where nightmares and insomnia have been consistently reported to increase the risk of suicidal behaviors.

Objective

To conduct a systematic review to examine the association between short sleep duration and suicidal behaviour (suicide ideation/attempt/suicide).

Methods

This is a systematic review of published research articles in the electronic database PubMed in the last 10 years. The query “sleep” or “sleep disorders” and “suicide” was used. Studies that assessed the relation between sleep duration and suicidal behaviour, with a well-defined index for sleep disorders and with an outcome measure of suicidal behavior were included.

Results

Of the 522 references founded, 33 articles met the inclusion criteria (1 review, 1 qualitative and 31 quantitative studies). An association between short sleep duration and suicidal behaviour was found in most of the studies with children/adolescents and adult samples. However, this relation was not verified in the research into the elderly.

Conclusion

The results point to a significant association between short sleep time and the presence of suicidal behaviours, for both adults and children/adolescents. The effect of short sleep duration seems to be more consistent with suicidal ideation, but not for attempts, needing further studies to highlight the importance of this link between sleep duration and suicide.

Disclosure of interest

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.