COVID-19 Pandemic and Physical Activity: An Observational Study on Sleep Quality and Anxiety

Mental alterations were described during the COVID-19 pandemic and sleep deprivationhas been reported as a consequence of social isolation. In Italy, the COVID-19 pandemic spread outat the beginning of 2020 determining severe lockdown periods. The aim of our study was to observethe effects of lockdown on sleep and anxiety in trained non-professional subjects and professionalathletes who continued to train during the lockdown period. Forty-six subjects (21 trained nonprofessionalsubjects and 25 professional athletes) were recruited from a variety of team andindividual sports to complete a battery of previously validated and widely used questionnairesassessing psychometric and anthropometric parameters, physical activity levels, lifestyle habits,and sleep quality. Subjects were aged 27.0 ± 5.14. All items were evaluated as percentages and chisquareand Fisher’s exact tests were performed, as appropriate. Our data showed that theprevalence of the difficulty of falling asleep (over 30%), the tendency of nocturnal awakenings (over30%), and moderate anxiety (over 38%) were at the same extent in the two groups. Of theprofessional athletes, 72.73% declared snoring during sleep vs 42.86% of non-professional subjects.No other significant differences were found between the two groups except for the perception ofbeing constant in daily activity, significantly more reported by trained subjects (p < 0.005). Our datashow a similar scenario of anxiety and sleep disturbances for the two groups, suggesting thatlockdown by the COVID-19 pandemic has partially mitigated the known beneficial effects due tophysical activity on mental health and sleep quality. Further analyses are necessary to define theassociated risk factors.