Sleep Med Psychophysiol.  1997 Jun;4(1):49-56.

Sleep and Panic

Affiliations
  • 1Department of Neuropsychiatry, College of Medicine, Ewha Women University, Korea.

Abstract

Nocturnal panic involves sudden awakening from sleep in a state of panic characterized by various somatic sensation of sympathetic arousal and intense fear. Many(18-71%) of the spontaneous panic attacks tend to occur from a sleeping state unrelated to the situational and cognitive context. Nocturnal panickers experienced daytime panics and general somatic sensation more frequently than other panickers. Despite frequent distressing symptoms, these patients tend to exhibit little social or occupational impairment and minimal agoraphobia and have a high lifetime incidence of major depression and a good response to tricyclic antidepressants. Sleep panic attacks arise from non-REM sleep, late stage 2 or early stage 3. The pathophysiology and the similarity of nocturnal panic to sleep apnea, dream-induced anxiety attacks, night terrors, sleep paralysis, and temporal lobe epilepsy are discussed.

Keyword

Nocturnal panic; Non-REM Sleep

MeSH Terms

Agoraphobia
Antidepressive Agents, Tricyclic
Anxiety
Arousal
Depression
Epilepsy, Temporal Lobe
Humans
Incidence
Night Terrors
Panic Disorder
Panic*
Sensation
Sleep Apnea Syndromes
Sleep Paralysis
Antidepressive Agents, Tricyclic
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