Elise Klein, “Relationship between PTSD Symptoms and Insomnia in the Year Following Trauma”
Mentor: Christine Larson, Psychology
Poster #86

An individual with PTSD can suffer from a variety of symptoms after they experience a traumatic event. A key symptom that can emerge is insomnia, causing a negative change in the quality and duration of their sleeping patterns. Although insomnia has the potential to occur for those with PTSD, the change in insomnia and PTSD symptom severity over time following trauma is lesser known. The present study looks at the relationship between PTSD and insomnia symptom severity as it changes in the year following a traumatic event, seeing if insomnia symptoms increased at the same time as PTSD symptoms. It also evaluates if gender influences the relationship between PTSD and Insomnia. The present study included 132 adults of various ages recruited from the emergency department who had experienced a traumatic event. PTSD symptoms and insomnia were assessed at multiple time points in the year following the trauma. PTSD symptom severity was assessed with PTSD Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5) and sleep quality was assessed with the Insomnia Severity Index (ISI). To assess change in symptoms over time for both the PCL-5 and the ISI, scores and two weeks were subtracted from twelve-month scores. There was a significant correlation between these PCL-5 and insomnia difference scores, r(132)=0.353, p<0.001, indicating that insomnia is likely to increase as PTSD does over time. The result indicates that gender does not impact the correlation, both males and females had similar results. These findings indicate that when PTSD symptom severity increases, insomnia is likely to increase as well.