According to a study from the Oxford Centre for Respiratory Medicine in the UK, those who suffer from even mild sleep apnea are at risk of suffering a heart attack. The study will be published in the first issue for November of the American Thoracic Society’s American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

“It was previously known that people with OSA severe enough to affect their daytime alertness and manifest in other ways are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease, but this finding suggests that many more people—some of whom may be completely unaware that they even have OSA—are at risk than previously thought,” said lead author of the study, Malcolm Kohler, M.D.

Read

Mild Sleep Apnea may also cause Heart Attack

American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Foundation (AAO-HNSF) has given the nod of approval to Holter oximeters  which tests out obstructive sleep apnea at home. The device has been labeled reliable as it accurately measures the outcomes for the surgical and non-surgical treatment of obstructive sleep apnea in adults and children.

Read

Home sleep test for Diagnosing Sleep Apnea Approved

According to Virginia Zamudio-Lange, a speaker last week in Washington at the 35th Annual Meeting of the American Association of Diabetes Educators only 47 percent doctors make the connection between sleep apnea and diabetes. Hence in the United States alone 85 percent of sleep apnea cases among diabetics go undiagnosed.

“Zamudio-Lange reported that in a sleep apnea screening protocol developed at Alamo Diabetes Team in San Antonio, diabetes educators asked patients about snoring and fatigue as they made preliminary diabetes assessments. Patients who reported apnea-like symptoms were categorized as high-risk and referred for further evaluation or possible treatment.”

Via Diabetes Health

Doctors tend to miss Sleep Apnea and Diabetes connection