Abstract Introduction Sleep has been recognized as one of the 3 pillars for good health, alongside physical activity and diet. These components are interrelated and have been contemplated in studies from different fields of health sciences. Due to the growing recognition that sleep science has been gaining in literature, we aimed to investigate the increase in publications of sleep in different categories of health science journals, and what are the main sleep disturbances/aspects published. Methods It was evaluated the top 10 journals with higher impact factors of each of the following categories according to Journal Citation Report: Psychology; Nutrition Pediatrics; Dentistry, Oral surgery Geriatrics and Sports Sciences. A search using the term “sleep” was performed at journal’s website restricting the date in 3 timeframes (T): Jan/2010 to Dec/2014 (T1), Jan/2015 to Dec/2019 (T2) and Jan/2020 to Sep/2025 (T3). The total number of publications and the percentage increase between periods was determined. Sleep-related terms most published in each category were achieved. Results All categories showed an increase in sleep-related publications between timeframes, with a more pronounced rise between T2 and T3, mainly in Geriatrics (362%) and Nutrition (124%). The overall percentage increase from T1 to T3 was greatest in Geriatrics (629%) and Sports Sciences (251%). “Sleep quality”, “insomnia”, “sleepiness” and “obstructive sleep apnea” were the terms with more publications. Conclusion Different categories of journals have been recognizing the relevance to include sleep as a variable in the studies. Our research shows scientists are increasingly focusing on how sleep impacts health and quality of life. Support (if any) Our studies are supported by the following funding agencies: AFIP (Associação Fundo de Incentivo à Pesquisa). MLA is recipient of a grant from the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (MLA: 2020/13467-8). MLA and ST are recipients of a fellowship from the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico.
Ishikura et al. (Fri,) studied this question.