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Newborn infants sleep 16 to 18 hours per day in 3-4 hour cyclic periods. By age 6 months, an infant may sleep as much as 6 continuous hours at night with the need for 1 feeding in the middle of the night. By one year of age, a child sleeps 14-15 hours a day with a midmorning and late afternoon nap. During the second year, a child sleeps 12 hours a day with only the mid-afternoon nap. By 4-5 years, the child sleeps 10-12 hours at night and has eliminated the nap. The success of the consolidation process is extremely important for both behavioral development and the sleep of parents. Good sleep in infants and children is also important for physical growth and school performance.

In general, children have little difficulty in initiating sleep and staying asleep on their own. The ability to learn this occurs in infancy. 95% of infants in the first 3-6 months cry upon awakening which necessitates parental soothing for a return to sleep. By 12 months, 70% of infants are now able to self-soothe themselves back to sleep. This is a learned behavior. Infants either learn to self-soothe themselves or learn that a cry results in a parental response that includes parental soothing of the child.

It is this learned / enforced behavior that often results in sleepless nights for parents. Creating consistent routines, setting limits and positive reinforcement for good habits go a long way to bedtime success and behavioral independence during the night.

Sleep apnea in adults is becoming better known in the media. Less attention has been given to the fact that 7-10% of children snore all night, every night, and 1% actually have problems breathing during sleep. Children with apnea or difficulty staying asleep may adopt odd or peculiar sleep positions to keep their airway open. They may have night-sweats, difficulty growing, daytime sleepiness, irritability, or aggressive behavior or learning difficulties.

According to Allan Siegal, author of "Dreamcatching", a child has 24000 dreams before age 18. According to the author, dreams are creative thoughts that when shared and discussed enhance parent-child emotional communication and can alert parents to childhood anxieties. By working through dreams, parents can reduce childhood worries.

Adolescents actually need 9-10 hours of sleep per night but usually average less than 7 hours per night. A chronic sleep debt hurts grades and can lead to reckless behavior. Fifty-five percent of all auto accidents due to falling asleep occur in drivers less than 25 years of age. Due to body clock shifts that occur in adolescence, some teen-agers naturally fall asleep in the early to mid am hours and are not fully alert until the early afternoon hours.

This delayed sleep phase syndrome can seriously affect school performance and family interactions. To accommodate school hours and to ensure food health, strict schedules to ensure adequate sleep are necessary but sometimes difficult to enforce.

Sleep Disorders Center at Regional Medical Center

Madisonville, Kentucky
(270) 825-5730 or 1-800-635-6506

Medical Director James Davis, MD
Clinical Coordinator Penny Hardison, RRT, RPSGT