Transitioning from daytime to nighttime operations in military training has a temporary negative impact on dynamic balance and jump performance in U.S. Army Rangers

Physical sleeping environment is related to insomnia risk and measures of readiness in US army special operations soldiers

BACKGROUND

US military service members have characteristically poor sleep, even when 'in garrison' or at one's home base. The physical sleeping environment, which is often poor in military-provided housing or barracks, may contribute to poor sleep quality in soldiers. The current study aimed to assess whether the sleeping environment in garrison is related to sleep quality, insomnia risk and military readiness.

METHODS

Seventy-four US army special operations soldiers participated in a cross-sectional study. Soldiers were queried on their sleeping surface comfort and the frequency of being awakened at night by excess light, abnormal temperatures and noise. Subjective sleep quality and insomnia symptoms were also queried, via the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and Insomnia Severity Index, respectively. Lastly, measures of soldier readiness, including morale, motivation, fatigue, mood and bodily pain, were assessed.

RESULTS

Soldiers reporting temperature-related and light-related awakenings had poorer sleep quality higher fatigue and higher bodily pain than soldiers without those disturbances. Lower ratings of sleeping surface comfort were associated with poorer sleep quality and lower motivation, lower morale, higher fatigue and higher bodily pain. Each 1-point increase in sleeping surface comfort decreased the risk for a positive insomnia screen by 38.3%, and the presence of temperature-related awakenings increased risk for a positive insomnia screen by 78.4%. Those living on base had a poorer sleeping environment than those living off base.

CONCLUSION

Optimising the sleep environment-particularly in on-base, military-provided housing-may improve soldier sleep quality, and readiness metrics. Providers treating insomnia in soldiers should rule out environment-related sleep disturbances prior to beginning more resource-intensive treatment.

Sleep and Infantry Battle Drill Performance in Special Operations Soldiers

BACKGROUND: Although multiple studies have documented the impact of insufficient sleep on soldier performance, most studies have done so using artificial measures of performance (e.g., tablet or simulator tests). The current study sought to test the relationship between sleep and soldier performance during infantry battle drill training, a more naturalistic measure of performance.METHODS: Subjects in the study were 15 junior Special Operations infantry soldiers. Soldiers wore an actigraph and reported their subjective sleep duration and quality prior to close quarter battle (CQB) drills. Experienced leaders monitored each iteration of the CQB exercise and recorded the number of errors committed.RESULTS: The number of errors committed during the live ammunition iterations was negatively correlated with subjective number of hours slept and subjective sleep efficiency/quality during the month prior. Soldiers with subjective sleep duration ≥7 h had a significantly lower number of errors than soldiers with subjective sleep duration <7 h (1.71 vs. 0.63 errors), and soldiers with sleep quality <85% committed more errors than those with sleep quality ≥85% (1.50 vs. 0.40 errors).DISCUSSION: These data preliminarily suggest that sleep quality and duration may influence subsequent performance on infantry battle drill training, particularly for soldiers with limited experience in battle drill conduction who have not yet perfected battle drill techniques. Future studies should enact sleep augmentation to determine the causal influence of sleep on performance in this setting.Mantua J, Shevchik JD, Chaudhury S, Eldringhoff HP, Mickelson CA, McKeon AB. Sleep and infantry battle drill performance in Special Operations soldiers. Aerosp Med Hum Perform. 2022; 93(7):557–561.