Musculoskeletal injuries are common in high-performance overhead athletes. Current studies indicated that injuries can be influenced by various factors, including psychological, biological, and social aspects. Sleep quality is an essential factor for the physical and mental health of athletes and can be influenced by several variables, such as anxiety, stress, and nutrition. Poor sleep quality may increase the risk of injury. Therefore, clinicians should assess sleep quality using validated instruments, such as the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). Nevertheless, it is still unclear the role of sleep quality in the shoulder pain of swimmers, due to the lack of studies directly evaluating the relationship between these factors. Our study hypothesizes that athletes with shoulder pain will present poorer sleep quality, compared to those without shoulder pain.

To compare sleep quality between swimmers with and without shoulder pain.

This is a cross-sectional observational study, which was approved by the Ethics Research Committee. We included competitive swimmers with or without musculoskeletal shoulder pain, of both sexes, aged between 12 and 60 years, with at least one year of competitive experience and a training regimen of at least twice a week. Sleep quality was assessed using the PSQI, which consists of 19 items across seven domains, as well as five additional questions for the bed partner. Statistical analysis was performed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), version 23.0. Data normality was assessed using the Shapiro-Wilk test. Between groups- comparisons for normally distributed data were conducted using Student’s t-test, while the Mann-Whitney U test was used for non-normally distributed data. Effect size (Cohen’s d) was calculated for between-group differences.

A total of 49 competitive swimmers were included in the study, with a mean age of 30,82 ± 14,34, 7,18 ± 6,41 years of sports practice, and 22 (44,9%) were women. The mean and standard deviation of the PSQI score for each group were as follows: Shoulder pain group: 6.30 ± 0.43 and no shoulder pain group: 5.90 ± 0.45. Results from comparison analysis indicated no statistically significant difference between the groups (p = 0.53; Mean difference (95% CI): 0.40 (-0.90 ± 1.71); Effect size (Cohen’s d) = 0.90).

The results indicate no statistically significant difference in sleep quality between athletes with and without shoulder pain.

The results of this study suggest that sleep quality is not different between swimmers with and without shoulder pain. However, different findings may be found using other measurement instruments for assessing sleep quality.