PRIMARY SNORING & OBSTRUCTIVE SLEEP APNEA

It is sleep disorder which occurs when a person’s breathing is interrupted during sleep. People with untreated sleep apnea stop breathing repeatedly during their sleep, sometimes hundreds of times which leads to lack of oxygen in the brain and the body.

TYPES OF SLEEP APNEA

OBSTRUCTIVE SLEEP APNEA : It occurs when throat muscles relax.

CENTRAL SLEEP APNEA : It occurs when your brain doesn’t send proper signals to the muscles which control breathing.

COMPLEX SLEEP APNEA SYNDROME : It also known as treatment-emergent central sleep apnea which occurs when someone has both obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea.

OSA should be suspected whenever a child presents with symptoms of loud or habitual snoring (snoring 3 or more nights per week), witnessed apnea, labored breathing, mouth breathing, or frequent nighttime arousals, especially in the setting of failure to thrive or obesity, nocturnal oxygen desaturations, life-threatening events, craniofacial abnormalities, poor school performance, or behavioral problems such as hyperactivity

In children, airway obstruction is often associated with nasal congestion, atopy, and adenotonsillar hypertrophy, where tonsillar hypertrophy is most common between the ages of 2 and 7 years.

Obesity is widely recognized as an etiologic component in adult OSA

DIAGNOSTIC STUDIES :  Polysomnography & Airway Evaluation.

A patient's history and clinical examination cannot predict the presence or severity of OSA. Similarly, an overnight oximetry study is a poor screening test for OSA, as obstructive respiratory events can occur without oxygen desaturations. Therefore, the gold standard for diagnosis of OSA is a PSG, commonly called a "sleep study.