Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2020

DOI

10.5935/1984-0063.20200029

Publication Title

Sleep Science

Volume

13

Issue

4

Pages

293-297

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: It remains unstudied whether poor sleep is involved in the etiology of gastrointestinal (GI) problems in athletes.

METHODS: Eighty-seven running and triathlon/duathlon race (>60 minutes) participants completed questionnaires to quantify the Sleep Problems Index-(SPI)-I and sleep parameters from the night before races. For GI symptoms, participants reported the severity (0-10 scale) of four upper and three lower symptoms during races. Spearman's correlations examined whether sleep measures were associated with in-race GI symptoms. Partial correlations were calculated to control for age, resting GI symptoms, and anxiety.

RESULTS: SPI-I scores correlated with in-race upper GI symptoms (rho=0.26, p=0.013). Controlling for anxiety attenuated this association (rho=0.17, p=0.117), while other control variables had little effect. Acute sleep quantity and quality were not associated with GI symptoms.

CONCLUSIONS: Chronic sleep dysfunction is modestly correlated with in-race upper GI symptoms, though future research should clarify whether this is mediated or moderated by factors like anxiety.

Comments

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Publisher's version available at:

Sleep Science Journal

Original Publication Citation

Wilson, P. B. (2020). Associations between sleep and in-race gastrointestinal symptoms: An observational study of running and triathlon race competitors. Sleep Science, 13(4), 293-297. https://doi.org/10.5935/1984-0063.20200029

ORCID

0000-0003-4052-5023 (Wilson)

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