Nightmares in People with COVID-19: Did Coronavirus Infect Our Dreams?

Introduction: A growing number of studies have demonstrated that the coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic has severely affected sleep and dream activity in healthy people. To date, no investigation has examined dream activity specifically in COVID-19 patients. Methods: As part of the International COVID-19 Sleep Study (ICOSS), we compared 544 COVID-19 participants with 544 matched-controls. A within-subjects comparison between pre-pandemic and pandemic periods computed separately for controls and COVID-19 participants were performed on dream recall and nightmare frequency (DRF; NF). Also, non-parametric comparisons between controls and COVID-19 participants were carried out. Further, we compared psychological measures between the groups collected during pandemic. Ordinal logistic regression to detect the best predictors of NF was performed. Results: We found that people reported greater dream activity during the pandemic. Comparisons between controls and COVID-19 participants revealed a) no difference between groups concerning DRF in the pre-pandemic period and during the pandemic; b) no difference between groups concerning nightmare frequency in the pre-pandemic period; and c) COVID-19 participants reported significantly higher NF than controls during pandemic (p = 0.003). Additionally, we showed that a) anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress-disorder (PTSD) symptom scores were higher in COVID-19 participants than controls; and b) quality of life and health as well as wellbeing (WHO-5) scores were significantly higher in controls than COVID-19 participants. Finally, ordinal logistic regression indicates that DRF (p < 0.001), PTSD (p < 0.001), anxiety (p = 0.018), insomnia (p = 0.039), COVID-19 severity (p = 0.014), sleep duration (p = 0.003) and age (p = 0.001) predicted NF. Discussion: Our work shows strong associations between increased nightmares in those reporting having had COVID-19. This suggests that the more that people were affected by COVID-19, the greater the impact upon dream activity and quality of life.

Automated summary

Our study reveals that the COVID-19 pandemic has a significant impact on sleep and dream activity, leading to increased nightmare frequency in COVID-19 patients. Psychological measures indicate that COVID-19 patients experience higher levels of anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms, as well as lower quality of life and wellbeing compared to controls. Dream recall frequency, PTSD symptoms, anxiety, insomnia, COVID-19 severity, sleep duration, and age are identified as predictors of nightmare frequency.