Past Issues

Background: To clarify the symptom discrepancies in suicidality, psychiatry outcomes, and quality of life (QOL), we did a cross-sectional study recruiting military personnel with hypersomnia or insomnia in three camps in northern Taiwan. Methods: With consents of volunteer audience attending a one-hour mental health education program, all qualified active service military personnel were asked to fill out copies of questionnaire describing their current situation. Results: About one-fourth of the 135 samples admitted their current condition of subjective feelings of insomnia (28.15%) or hypersomnia (24.44%), but < 15% of them had ever asked health providers for psychological or clinical help. Compared with controls without any sleep problem, individuals with suicidal ideation in the other two groups were more prevalent, with higher anxiety, depression, and significantly lower total score of QOL (p < 0.05). The insomnia group was significantly unsatisfied with their sleep the most (p < 0.001). The hypersomnia group showed significantly higher mean scores of irritability (p < 0.001). Those findings were more vigorous and predominate even adjusting for confounding effects of age and sex. Conclusion: This study revealed a different prevalence and adversity between subjective insomnia and hypersomnia groups among military population. Further relevant evaluation and management are warranted.