Exploring Relationship of Poor Sleeping Habits with Prenatal Stress among Pregnant Women in Pakistan: a Cross-Sectional Study

Objective Pregnancy is a complex phenomenon accompanied by biological, physiological and psychosocial changes for a mother. It is also regarded as a stressful life event where a woman's role, identity and interpersonal relationships are restructured. The present study from Pakistan explores the association of sleep quality and poor sleeping habits with prenatal stress using Pittsburgh Sleep quality Index. Results There were a total of 516 women (mean age = 29.82 years), with more than half reporting poor sleep quality. Ethnically, a majority (395, 76.6%) were natives of the Punjab province while rest were non-natives. A high percentage of respondents reported poor subjective sleep quality (22.1%), sleep latency (44.1%), habitual sleep efficiency (27.5%), sleep disturbance (30.1%), use of medications (7.1%) and daytime dysfunction (29.5%). According to logistic regression analysis, respondents with poor sleep quality were 2.24 (95% CI = 1.55-3.22, P < 0.001) times more likely to have high stress levels (P < 0.001).