In Friday’s issue of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported on an analysis of data from a new sleep module added to the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) in 2009. This analysis determined that, among 74,571 adult respondents in 12 states, 35.3 percent reported sleeping less than seven hours on average during a 24-hour period; 48 percent reported snoring; 37.9 percent reported unintentionally falling asleep during the day at least one day in the preceding 30 days; and 4.7 percent reported nodding off or falling asleep while driving in the preceding 30 days.
The CDC also reported on an analysis of data from the 2005 – 2008 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), which found that at least one third of U.S. residents do not get enough sleep on a regular basis, and this impairs their ability to perform daily tasks. Results show that 37.1 percent of U.S. adults reported regularly sleeping less than seven hours per night. Among six sleep-related difficulties assessed, the most prevalent was not being able to concentrate on doing things, reported by 23.2 percent of U.S. adults.
