Prevalence of sleep disturbances in Chinese healthcare professionals: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Objective: The current review is a systematic, quantitative meta-analysis aimed at examining the pooled prevalence of sleep disturbances in Chinese healthcare professionals. Furthermore, we explore the possible causes of the inconsistencies in the current estimates. Methods: Systematic searches of databases were conducted for literature published on English (EMBASE, PubMed and Web of Science) and Chinese (Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wan Fang database and Chinese Science & Technology journal database) databases until 25 May 2018. Statistical analyses were performed using SPSS and R software, the prevalence of sleep disturbances was pooled using random-effects model. Results: A total of 52 studies with 31,749 participants were included. The pooled prevalence of sleep disturbances among Chinese healthcare professionals is 39.2% (95% CI: 36.0%-42.7%). Higher sleep disturbance rates are associated with being female, lower cut-off of Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), later survey year, bigger sample size, the standardized assessment tool, being a nurse, and shift work. Sample size and cut-off of PSQI were significant moderators for heterogeneity. Conclusion: Sleep disturbances are common in Chinese healthcare professionals, and their prevalence is much higher than the general population. Further research is needed to identify effective strategies for preventing and treating sleep disturbances among healthcare professionals. (C) 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.