Relation between sleep status of preterm infants aged 1-2 years and mothers' parenting stress.

AIM: The aim of this study is to compare infants' sleep measures through an actigraph and maternal parenting stress among preterm and full-term mothers, and to explore the factors affecting maternal parenting stress in relation to infants' sleep. METHOD: The subjects were 44 pairs of mothers and children. Twenty-one were in the preterm group, and 23 were in the full-term group. Inclusion criteria for preterm infants were born at less than 36 weeks and birth weight of less than 2,500g. Parenting Stress Index Short Form assesses maternal perception of the degree of parenting stress: the children's domain (PSIc), and the parent's domain (PSIp). An actigraph (Micro-mini RC, Ambulatory Monitoring Inc., Ardsley, NY) was applied to assess the infants' sleep measures. RESULTS: The PSI showed significant differences, with high scores in parenting stress in the preterm group. Also, the number of mothers who complained infant's sleep issues was significantly higher in preterm group. Most of sleep measures showed improvement by their age in both preterm and full-term infants. Multiple linear regression analysis showed that sleep efficiency, longest sleep duration at night time accounted for 71% of stress in the PSIc of preterm group. CONCLUSION: The parenting stress among mothers of preterm infants showed significantly higher than those of mothers of full-term infants. The mothers of preterm infants were concerned about infant's nocturnal sleep quality. Language: en