Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 May 2011
Aim – The widespread diffusion of sleep disorders (in particular, insomnia) in the general population and the presence of sleep complaints in many mental disorders and physical illnesses justifies an interest in their assessment and treatment, still today commonly underestimated. This study aims to describe the inexpensive and relatively easy-to-use self-report measures of sleep available in literature. Method – A literature search was conducted throughout the electronic literature database “Pubmed”, selecting the pertinent articles published up to December 2006. Results – The recovered material takes the following fields into account: aspect of sleep measured, statistical population, structure, time frame, sub-scales and psychometric properties. International literature presents somewhat heterogeneous sleep self-evaluation tools, which mainly measure sleep quality and the specific causes of sleep interference. As for the Italian context, the recovered material is somewhat modest, taking into account the number of publications. Conclusions – the critical points met in this review have led us to underline the characteristics of a hypothetical tool for sleep assessment to include in routine diagnoses.
Declaration of Interest: The authors have received no fees or other financial support potentially in conflict of interest with this scientific work.