Restless legs syndrome in a population of northern Tanzania: A community‐based study

Abstract

Restless legs syndrome (RLS) is a highly prevalent movement disorder. However, prevalences seem to vary amongst different ethnicities. To date, no community-based prevalence studies on RLS have been reported from the African continent. We have conducted a community-based, door-to-door study in northern Tanzania. Over a period of 16 months, 7,654 people aged 14 years and older were screened for the RLS Essential Diagnostic Criteria. Sampling was performed according to the method of "multistage cluster sampling." People who screened positive where reinterviewed and physically examined by a specialist neurologist. During the screening phase, 10 people answered "yes" to at least one of the screening questions. After reinterviewing those people, the result was confirmed in five people only. After careful re-evaluation of the results, only one person was diagnosed with RLS. Because of methodological limitations a definite prevalence may only be calculated from larger population-based studies of different African ethnicities with screening questions adapted to the cultural context.

Integrating Sleep Management into Clinical Practice

“…The prevalence among Caucasians of European descent (America and Europe) tends to be 9-15% and there is slight female preponderance (Berger, Luedemann, Trenkwalder, John, & Kessler, 2004), in the middle east it is slightly lower averaging at about 5% (Bahammam, Sharif, Jammah, & Bahammam, 2011) and further east in Asia it is even lower around 2% (Nomura, Inoue, Kusumi, Uemura, & Nakashima, 2008;Rangarajan, Rangarajan, & D'Souza, 2007). Lastly, in Africa the prevalence seems to be even lower with only one study conducted that found only one subject out of 7,654 people interviewed to have RLS (Winkler et al, 2010).…”

Restless Leg Syndrome Across the Globe

“…This higher prevalence of RLS/WED in persons of African descent than in European descent is not consistent with the very low RLS/ WED prevalence found in Tanzania. 5,14 This result suggests that there are other factors influencing the expression of RLS/WED. These factors might include environment, culture, or medical comorbidity.…”

“…These studies were conducted in Tanzania, a 2010 study in a rural area and a 2014 study in an urban area. 5,14 Both studies modeled questions based on the four 2007 IRLSSG criteria and translated these questions into Kiswahili and then back to English to ensure accuracy. Prevalence estimates were low, partly because of the 2-phase screening approach: first questionnaire screening and, if positive, then an interview and examination by a neurologist.…”

“…[4][5][6][7][8] This article outlines the world epidemiology of RLS/WED. To do this, different epidemiologic studies of RLS/WED carried out in community populations are reviewed by continent.…”

Restless Legs Syndrome and Pain Disorders: What’s in common?

“…The prevalence of RLS/WED symptoms is about 2.4-10 % in western countries [11, 12•, 13••, 14•] and less frequent in East Asia and sub-Saharian Africa [15][16][17]. In a survey enrolling more than 16,000 adults, Allen et al, found that despite 81 % of the patients having reported their complaints to the primary care physician, only 6 % were given a precise diagnosis of RLS/ WED [18].…”