Objective: This study aimed to investigate how sleep and physical activity habits related to cognitive functioning, in naturalistic settings, in early Huntington's disease (HD). Method: Forty-two participants with the expanded HD repeat (20 manifest, 22 premanifest) and 29 healthy controls wore Fitbit One sleep and activity monitors for 7 days and 7 nights. They used a smartphone application to complete daily sleep and activity diaries, sleep and mood inventories, and a brief battery of cognitive tests, which were completed on Day 8 of the study. All data were collected in naturalistic home and community settings. Results: Amongst participants with the expanded HD repeat, greater time spent in bed, measured by Fitbit, was associated with poorer accuracy and response speed on a test of visual memory, whereas lower levels of physical activity, measured by Fitbit, were associated with poorer accuracy on a test involving a working memory component. Neither time in bed nor physical activity is associated with a test of psychomotor speed. Groups were mostly similar across a range of Fitbit and self-report measures of sleep and physical activity, although the Manifest-HD group spent more time in bed than the Premanifest-HD and Healthy Control groups and had better self-reported sleep quality and more self-reported time spent sitting than the Healthy Control group and the Premanifest-HD group, respectively. Conclusions: Sleep timing and physical activity relate to cognitive functioning in HD and may be important targets for management in behavioral intervention studies aimed at improving cognition in HD.
Key PointsQuestion: How do sleep and physical activity habits relate to the cognitive functioning of people with the expanded Huntington's Disease (HD) repeat? Findings: Greater time in bed is associated with poorer visual memory performance and less physical activity is associated with poorer working memory performance. Neither time in bed nor physical activity levels associated significantly with psychomotor speed. Importance: Sleep and physical activity habits may be important targets for interventions aimed at improving cognition in HD. Next Steps: Future studies should utilize longitudinal assessment to determine if, and in what way, long-term physical activity and sleep habits relate to cognitive symptom progression in HD.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.