Sleepwalking, 5

Sleepwalking is a common parasomnia affecting up to four percent of adults. It involves complex behaviors that occur during arousals from non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep. During an episode of sleepwalking the brain is partially awake, resulting in complex behaviors, and partially in NREM sleep with no conscious awareness of actions. The reported largest prospective cohort study on adult sleepwalkers seen in a clinic, the results of which appeared in the journal SLEEP, involved a case-control study of 100 adult patients in whom primary sleepwalking was diagnosed from June 2007 to January 2011. Exclusion criteria included a positive clinical history of REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD), a similar parasomnia that involves violent dream-related behaviors emerging during REM sleep. The age of the sleepwalkers ranged from 18 to 58 years with a median age of 30. Results reported a higher frequency of daytime sleepiness, fatigue, insomnia, depressive and anxiety , and altered quality of life in patients with sleepwalking compared to the control group.