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Pediatric Sleep Studies

Trinity Health Mid-Atlantic offers sleep studies at St. Mary Medical Center for children as young as three years old who are having difficulty falling or staying asleep. Pediatric sleep disorders are becoming more widely recognized as physicians, teachers, and parents learn more about the warning signs in young people. Children who are difficult to awaken in the morning or who have trouble staying awake during the day may benefit from an evaluation by a sleep specialist. Pediatric sleep disorders can affect school performance and test scores and also may cause an inability to pay attention during class.

Parents are required to stay with children under age 18 during the overnight studies. The Sleep/Wake Disorders team carefully diagnoses and cares for children with any type of sleep disorder, and provides support and education to parents. Children with sleep disorders may show excitability, irritability, difficulty staying focused on tasks or school activities, and poor attention span. Children with upper airway restriction may not snore like adults; instead, they may have raspy breathing or sound congested while sleeping. In some cases, a child's symptoms of sleep disorder mirror symptoms often associated with attention deficit disorder/attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADD/ADHD). Proper diagnosis is a necessary first step to assure that symptoms are treated properly.

The Trinity Health Mid-Atlantic Sleep Disorders team carefully diagnoses and cares for children with any type of sleep disorder, including:

Bedtime struggles and night waking

A chronic condition including attention difficulty, hyperactivity and impulsiveness.

The grinding of teeth during sleep.

Harsh sound that occurs when breathing is partially obstructed while sleeping.

Sleep walking, sleep terrors
Delayed sleep phase syndrome.
Cessation of airflow at the mouth or nose because of a decrease in or absence of respiratory effort, most commonly seen in infants or patients with neurological disorders.
Inadequate respiratory drive during sleep to maintain normal gas exchange (oxygen and carbon dioxide levels in the blood), which may occur in episodic form in many patients, but in a continuous, more severe form in a small subset of patients.
A clinical condition that may occur at any age, usually associated with snoring (except in infancy) and manifested by increased work of breathing and repeated episodes of partial or complete obstruction to airflow through the mouth and nose during sleep.
Select infants and children may require nightly (or more frequent) mechanical ventilatory support due to a disease involving the central nervous system, respiratory muscles, chest wall and/or lungs. The most important and reliable time to assess the adequacy of the patient's ventilatory assistance is during sleep.
Excessive daytime sleepiness, cataplexy, sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations, usually occurring in adolescence or early adulthood.
Body rocking, head banging, head rolling, and periodic limb movement disorder.