Cerebral palsy (CP), a long-term disease, may change parents' attitude towards ill child and may cause certain differences in everyday functioning between children with CP and healthy persons to increase. The aim of the study was to estimate the quality of sleep habits in children with CP.

93 boys and girls with CP aged 1-18 years participated in the study. A control group included 300 healthy children matched in age. The study was conducted using internally developed questionnaires of sleep disorders and sleep habits in the Department of Developmental Neurology of the Poznan University of Medical Sciences.

The health status of a child with CP was most frequently estimated as fairly good. In our study, 53.7% children with CP slept with another person in the same bed, 78,5 % of children slept in one room with other family members. Almost 53,3% of children with CP needed over 20 minutes to fall asleep, while in the CG only 35.0%; it was statistically significant difference. Day naps occurred in 41.9% of CP children and 27.7% of healthy ones. The statistical analysis shows a significant correlation between CP and the sleep habits.

The quality of sleep habits in children with CP was significantly different than in the CG children. Additional research on larger group of patients with CP is needed to correlate the prevalence of sleep disorder symptoms with motor impairment, Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) level and epilepsy.