The investigation of patients with epilepsy in terms of alexithymia, sleep quality and mental symptoms

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the relationships among alexithymia, sleep quality and mental symptoms in patients with epilepsy. Methods: This study was conducted with 96 patients admitted to the Epilepsy Unit of Celal Bayar University Medical Faculty Hospital as a descriptive cross-sectional study. Data were collected from Socio-demographic Data Form, The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS) and Symptom Check List (SCL-90-R). In the analysis of data, Student's t-test, ANOVA and Pearson Correlation analysis were used. Results: The level of sleep quality of 49% of patients was poor. 41.8% of the patients was alexithymic. It was found that alexithymic patients had poor sleep quality by taking higher scores from PSQI (t=1.99, p=0.040). Alexithymic patients SCL-90-R (general symptom level) was higher than non-alexithymic patients. A positive correlation (p=0.000, r=0.560) was determined between PSQI and SCL-90-R (general symptom level) scores of patients with epilepsy. Conclusion: As a result, the level of alexithymia in patients' sleep quality was worse. Moreover deterioration in mental status of patients was found to lead to deterioration of sleep quality. (Anatolian Journal of Psychiatry 2011; 12:114-120)