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In December 2019, the world witnessed the first case of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which began to spread rapidly through Wuhan, Hubei Province, and other provinces in China, then the rest of the world.1-3 Four months later, Saudi Arabia’s government had announced the first case of the COVID-19.4 The Saudi government has undertaken many notable measures to limit the outbreak, including forming a high-level committee incorporating prominent government institutions, the halt of the issuance of tourist visas for all purposes, the immediate suspension of domestic and international air travel.5 Besides, the government has imposed a 2-week quarantine period for returning travelers from countries with high infection rates, banned mass gatherings for all purposes, enforced complete or partial lockdowns in different areas, closed and disinfected the 2 holy mosques, and increased public awareness and education.6 These measures are expected to impact the psyche of the Saudi population negatively. Outbreaks are well known to affect human psychological well-being significantly.7 Therefore, many cases of depression, anxiety, panic attacks, sleep disorders, and posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms have been observed during and after serious outbreaks and pandemics, such as COVID-19.8
Sleep disorders or inadequate sleep contribute to epileptic seizures, depression, accidents, heart disease, diabetes, and poor life quality.9 Therefore, many studies have paid great attention to sleep and sleep disorders during the COVID-19 outbreak.10-13 Huang and Zhao assessed sleep quality in china (n=603) using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and showed that during the lockdown, the Chinese population had suffered from poor sleep quality.14 Furthermore, Yu et al15 showed that most of the Hong Kong population reported that their sleep had deteriorated following the outbreak of COVID-19. Despite the aforementioned evidence, data regarding the association between the COVID-19 lockdown and the sleep disorders of Meddle East countries’ general population, especially Saudi Arabia, are scanty. Thus, our study aimed to assess sleep quality among the Saudi population during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Methods
This was a cross-sectional, internet-based questionnaire that was performed according to the Helsinki Declaration principles and was conducted among the Saudi population during the lockdown of COVID-19. The STrengthening the Reporting of OBservational studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) checklist was followed during reporting this study.16 The survey...