Urinary problems that cause urination at night this can be caused by an enlarged prostate or an overactive bladder.Painful conditions, including osteoarthritis.Gastroesophageal reflux disease, which causes heartburn symptoms and can be affected by big meals late at night.Heart and lung conditions which affect breathing, such as heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.Sleep problems due to an underlying medical problem. Although older adults do often suffer from what’s called “primary” sleep disorders, many sleep problems they experience are “secondary” sleep problems, meaning they are secondary to an underlying medical condition whose main symptoms are not sleep related.Ĭommon health conditions that can disrupt sleep in older adults include: 5 Common Causes of Sleep Problems in Older Adultsġ. Last but not least, if you (or your older relative) have experienced the very common combination of waking up to pee at night and difficulty sleeping, I highly recommend listening to this podcast episode, which features a geriatrician who is an expert on this: 092- Interview: Addressing Nighttime Urination & Insomnia in Aging. I’ll also tell you about what approaches have been proven to work, to help treat insomnia and sleep problems in older adults. In this article, I’ll share what I found out. Recently, I did a little research to identify the top causes of sleep problems in older adults. Figuring out what’s going on is always the first step in being able to improve things.Īnd remember, getting enough good quality sleep helps maintain brain health, physical health, and mood. So when your older relatives say they aren’t sleeping well, you’ll want to help them check for these. That said, although aging by itself does change sleep, it’s also quite common for older adults to develop health problems that can cause sleep disturbances. So it’s probably not realistic to expect that as you get older, you’ll sleep as long or as soundly as when you were younger. (See this post for more on how sleep changes with aging.) Basically, older adults tend to get sleepy earlier in the evening, and tend to sleep less deeply than when they were younger. What should you do if an older person complains of not sleeping well at night?Įxperts do believe that “normal aging” brings on some changes to sleep.

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