Sleep quality of older adults living in different housing arrangements

Objective: Our previous study showed that sleep quality (SQ) of 167 retirement home residents was impaired in 77.8% participants. Sleep efficiency, sleep latency, and use of sleep medications were impaired the most, while subjective SQ and daytime functioning were high. The aim of the present study was to examine SQ of community-dwelling (CD) older adults in Zagreb, and to compare it with SQ of those residing in institutions. Life satisfaction was the strongest predictor of SQ in our nursing home (NH) study so we wanted to explore whether it would be significantly related to SQ of CD older adults. Method: The results of 55 CD participants (80% females, 63-86 years) were compared with the results of 60 NH participants (85.5% females, 69-87 years). All were ambulatory, without diagnosis of dementia, and the data was collected individually by trained interviewers in a local gerontology centre or in nursing homes. SQ was assessed by the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). Two questions were used to measure subjective health, and a standardized scale to measure life satisfaction. Results: The results showed that SQ of CD participants was significantly better than SQ of NH residents when total PSQI scores were compared (MCD = 5.6 vs. MNH = 8.2, p = .000). The differences in the same direction were observed for sleep duration (p = .000), sleep efficiency (p = .000) and use of sleep medication (p = .011). The overall life satisfaction was of similar value in both groups (p = .065) and it was relatively high, but their self-rated health was somewhat better in CD participants (p = .044). In CD participants life satisfaction was associated only with shorter sleep latency (p < .05). When housing arrangement was controlled for, life satisfaction was significantly correlated to total PSQI score, subjective sleep quality, sleep latency and sleep disturbances (r = -.28 to -.53, p < .01) and to self-rated health (r = .36, p < .01). Conclusion: Our results show that the SQ of CD older adults is expectedly better than SQ of NH residents, but the factors contributing to SQ seem to differ depending on housing arrangement.