Introduction: Attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common developmental disorders in childhood which lasts lifelong. Sleep structure and sleep spindle features are disorganized in ADHD. In this study, we aimed to look for a new, simple, inexpensive, and an easily detectable electrographic marker in the diagnosis of ADHD by using electroencephalography (EEG). Method: We included treatment free 35 patients with ADHD and 32 healthy children (HC) who were examined by polysomnography (PSG) and EEG for sleep disorders. The ADHD group were separated into three groups according to predominant presentations of ADHD. We determined the sleep staging and slow and fast sleep spindles, calculated each spindle's amplitude, frequency, activity, duration and density at non rapid eye movement (REM) sleep stage 2. Results: Slow sleep spindle's amplitude, duration, density and activity are significantly higher in ADHD group (most significant in ADHD-I) than the HC group (p < 0,05). Sleep spindle's features are not statistically significant between in ADHD subgroups. Conclusions: In children with ADHD, slow sleep spindles showed higher amplitude, activity, density and duration in the frontal regions. These results indicate that slow sleep spindles in children with ADHD may reflect executive dysfunction and slow frontal spindles may be useful as a new electrographic marker in children with ADHD. This is the first study of its kind evaluating all aspects of sleep spindles in ADHD patients.
Keywords: ADHD; EEG; childhood; polysomnography; sleep; spindle.