ABSTRACT

The numbers of the elderly people and patients have recentlybeen increasing due to increase of the life expectancy. At the sametime, the rate of the elderly patients who have been in hospital isincreasing. Most patients in hospital may experience sleepdisturbances due to the different environmental factors as well astheir physical and emotional problems. Pattern of the sleepdisturbances for the adult and elderly patients were compared, butthere found no specific differences between two groups.Nevertheless, most patients complained a variety of environmentalfactors that might disturb their sleep while they were in hospital.The findings were discussed in the context of nursinginterventions which improve the quality of sleep for the patients inhospital.