POTS syndrome patients have orthostatic intolerance. This basically means there is difficulty remaining in a standing position due to development of symptoms such as dizziness, almost passing out, and classically a dramatic increase in heart rate. Other complaints include poor exercise tolerance, weakness, mental fog and fatigue. Sleep disturbances have also been well characterized in P.O.T.S syndrome. Several studies have looked in to this, and we will briefly review them here.
POTS syndrome patients have described poor sleeping at night, waking up repeatedly at night, and sweating at night. As far back as 1921, it was shown in a study of soldiers, that those with POTS like symptoms of orthostatic intolerance also had sleep disturbances. One study showed that around 30% of POTS syndrome patients have sleep disturbances. Another study used questionnaire to investigate sleep patterns among POTS syndrome patients. POTS patients were found to have more sleep disturbances and higher levels of daytime sleepiness combined with fatigue as compared to healthy counterparts. In a study of POTS patients that used polysomnography, it was noted that there was diminished sleep quality, excessive daytime sleepiness, and decreased proportion of stage 2 sleep, which usually takes up around 50% of the sleeping time. These findings are similar to patients with insomnia. POTS syndrome patients were also noted to have increased variability of heart rate during different stages of sleep.
Taken together, these studies highlight that POTS syndrome patients are much more likely than others to experience sleep disturbances. In turn these sleep disturbances are associated with decrease in quality of life and form an important part of symptoms experiences by POTS syndrome patients.
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How can I improve my sleep with POTS?
Melatonin helps me a lot. I take 2 or 3 .5mcg tablets and I sleep much better. Sometimes I still do wake up but definitely not as often.
I find that after having an energy drink or coffee my symptoms are much better. Could this be to do with Caffeine?
Hi,
I am just recently diagnosed but have found the same to be true about coffee, long before I knew what I was dealing with.
I used to have coffee in the afternoon and it helped my general malaise. After starting my research on living with POTS, I gave up coffee for a while. I felt sick last night and could not sleep, got up and had a small cuppa, went back to bed and slept well.
There is a lot of conflicting information about caffeine (and everything on the internet) Most everything I have read has been very helpful, but we are all so different, we need to be mindful to what our actual experience to it is.
I am reclaiming coffee ;^) !
Hi,
I have a rare subtype called hyperadrenergic state pots. Not sure of your type, but this is what was explained to me:
Caffeine can help by bringing up blood pressure. The whole thing with pots is that the body freaks out from thinking there’s loss of blood volume. The ways that pots patients can try and trick the body out of that response is to increase fluid intake and bring up blood pressure. Common ways are using Florinef and Midodrine, a high sodium diet, drinking lots of water, beta blockers (in pots they bring up bp by decreasing heart rate), and Clonidine. The reason why there’s conflicting reports about caffeine is because of its tendency to contribute to dehydration. Hope that helps you!