For children with insomnia symptoms, 43.3% have a persistent trajectory, according to a study published in Pediatrics. Julio Fernandez-Mendoza, PhD, and colleagues studied 502 children (median age, 9) 7.4 years later as adolescents (median age, 16), and 15 years later as adults (median age, 24) to examine the developmental trajectories of insomnia symptoms. At all three time points, insomnia symptoms were ascertained as moderate-to-severe difficulties initiating and/or maintaining sleep via parent or self-report. The most frequent trajectory among children with insomnia symptoms was persistence (43.3%), followed by remission (26.9% and 11.2% since childhood and since adolescence, respectively) and a waxing-and-waning pattern (18.6%). The most frequent trajectory among children with normal sleep was persistence (48.1%), then developing insomnia symptoms (15.2% and 20.7% since adolescence and in adulthood, respectively) and a waxingand-waning pattern (16.0%). Among short-sleeping children and adolescents, the odds of insomnia symptoms worsening into adult insomnia (22.0% of children and 20.8% of adolescents) were increased 2.6- and 5.5-fold, respectively.
