March 18, 2013  

Presleep activities and time to sleep onset is a constant issue for many parents. In a recent study in the Journal Pediatrics from February 2013, Foley et. al. looked at this exact issue. Although this was not a great study design, the results make sense.

Sleep is a major discussion point in every physicians office, especially when it is related to teens and tweens. What they do for the few hours before bed has everything to do with the quality of their sleep. We all can attest to cranky behavior in sleep deprived children and adolescents.

Foley noted that screen sedentary time dominated the presleep period and was associated with a later onset of sleep. While this is not surprising in the average American household, it is a wake up call to check your own house rules.

In a previous letter we talked about the dangers of reduced sleep on cognition, disease and sports injuries. There are too many things to name that sleep effects, i.e. seizures, hormones, growth, etc... Removing the access to screens before bedtime is a perfect way to reduce this inherent risk to our normal physiologic functioning.

Thoughts:

1) No TV or games in the bedroom - period!

2) Have a phone/laptop/game docking station in the kitchen where it is easily visible by parents for monitoring at night - this removes the nagging factor and gives the children the autonomy of self placement. The thought of letting them self regulate in their room is proven impossible by studies like this.

3) Give your children concrete examples of the effects of sleep deprivation on their body.

4) Pay attention to times when they don't sleep enough and increase the gain on your stress meter and expect to be calm when they meltdown because it will happen.

5) Watch your modeling behavior. Reduce your nighttime screen activity and they will learn through example.

Screens are worth reducing,