Patient-reported pain and impaired sleep quality in adult patients with cystic fibrosis

Background: Sleep impairment has been described in patients with cystic fibrosis (CF). Pain is a known cause of sleep disturbance and as pain is commonly reported in patients with CF, we sought to find an association between impaired sleep quality and pain. Methods: Fifty adult CF patients completed surveys of pain and sleep quality. The results were analyzed with additional clinical data including age, sex, nutritional status, and lung function. Results: Thirty-two patients (64%) reported recent pain and 33 patients (66%) reported abnormal sleep quality. The patients with pain report worse sleep quality than those without pain (p = 0.006). There was a strong correlation between impaired sleep quality and pain (p < 0.0001). Conclusions: We found that pain and poor sleep quality are reported in a majority of adult CF patients and there is a strong correlation between the two. This will have important clinical implications in the evaluation and treatment of adult patients.