Consumo de alimentos açucarados e qualidade do sono no primeiro ano de vida: dados de uma coorte de nascimentos no Nordeste do Brasil – SAND

Abstract

The early consumption of sugary foods in early childhood has been increasing in Brazil and in the world, in parallel to the decrease in the duration and quality of sleep, and this bilateral cause and effect relationship between sleep problems and feeding has been the target of recent investigations, especially the impact of sugared food consumption in short sleep duration and occurrence of excessive nocturnal awakenings. Although the literature still lacks investigation to confirm the hypothesis, the importance of adequate sleep for child growth and development is consensual. In this perspective, the present study aimed to present a pattern of sleep and sugar consumption and to investigate the association between the consumption of sugary foods with sleep duration and frequency of nocturnal awakenings during the first year of life. For this purpose, this work is structured in a literature review chapter, covering the following topics: 1. Consumption of sugary foods in the first years of life; 2. Indicators of quality of sleep in the first years of life and 3. Relationship between sugary foods consumption and sleep quality; and an original paper entitled: “Consumo de alimentos açucarados e qualidade do sono no primeiro ano de vida: dados de uma coorte de nascimentos no Nordeste do Brasil – SAND”, which was submitted to the Revista Mineira de Enfermagem. The research’s data are from a larger investigation entitled: "Saúde, Alimentação, Nutrição e Desenvolvimento Infantil: um estudo de coorte", which followed infants born in the city of Rio Largo/AL, from birth to 12 months of age. Information about sleep was obtained through the Brief Infant Sleep Questionnaire, a semi-structured questionnaire developed and validated by Sadeh (2004) and food consumption was investigated through an instrument comprising a list of 70 foods and preparations, by which mothers were asked about the regular supply of each item. Up to 24 hours after collection, data were double-entered and validated in the Epi Info Software. To verify whether there was an association between consumption of sugary foods with short sleep duration and excessive nighttime awakenings, Pearson's chi-squared or Fisher's exact tests were performed using the Stata/SE Software. The main results were: more than 50% of children had short sleep and about 20% woke up more than twice during the night, in addition, all children consumed at least one of the sugary food categories at 12 months. From this, we concluded that sugar consumption, short sleep duration and excessive nighttime awakenings were frequent. Thus, further studies are needed to endorse the association.