Sleep Apnea Can Be Fatal--Study

Sleep Apnea, a condition in which breathing stops for more than 10 seconds during sleep, may do more harm than just disrupting your good night’s sleep. The sleep-related disorders due to sleep apnea may put a person an increased risk of dying, new study suggests.

Sleep apnea occurs when a person’s breathing is disrupted during sleep. Men, obese people, and people over 40 are at significant risk for sleep apnea. If untreated, sleep apnea can cause hypertension, stroke, or heart failure.

A new study by Australian researchers suggests that people with severe sleep apnea may be up to six times more likely to die prematurely, and that risk increases if the sleep disorder is left untreated.

Earlier findings too have linked sleep apnea to increased risk for death. However, those findings were based on the data from sleep centers rather than in the general community. The new Australian study, published in the Aug. 1 edition of Sleep, suggests that the risk is present among all people with obstructive sleep apnea.

"This is the first study to demonstrate an independent association between all-cause mortality and sleep apnea in a community-based study," researcher Nathaniel Marshall, a postdoctoral fellow at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research in Sydney, said in an American Academy of Sleep Medicine news release.

"The size of the increased mortality risk was surprisingly large," Marshall said. "In our particular study, a six fold increase means that having significant sleep apnea at age 40 gives you about the same mortality risk as somebody aged 57 who doesn't have sleep apnea," he said.

Marshall's team reached their findings after studying 380 men and women, 40 to 65 years old, who participated in the Busselton Health Study. Of the participants, three had severe obstructive sleep apnea, 18 had moderate sleep apnea, and 77 had mild sleep apnea. Rest 285 people did not suffer from the condition.

After the14 years of follow-up, researchers found that about 33% of those with moderate to severe sleep apnea died, compared with 6.5% of those with mild sleep apnea and 7.7% of those without the condition.

"Our findings ... remove any reasonable doubt that sleep apnea is a fatal disease," Marshall said. "People who have, or suspect that they have sleep apnea should consult their physicians about diagnosis and treatment options."

Another report, published in the same issue of the journal, also links sleep apnea with an increased risk for death. In their study, researchers from the University of Wisconsin found that sleep apnea was associated with a threefold increased risk of dying.

To reach their findings, researcher Terry Young, PhD, professor of epidemiology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and colleagues followed more than 1,500 adults for 18 years who had been screened for sleep apnea at the start of the study.

After the follow-up, they found that about 19% of those with severe sleep apnea died during the study period compared with only 4% of those without sleep apnea.

Sleep apnea or sleep-disordered breathing, is a common sleeping disorder that causes frequent pauses in breathing during sleep. It is a condition in which breathing is briefly interrupted or even stops episodically during sleep, and is often accompanied by snoring. In the United States, nearly 6% of adults suffer from moderate to severe forms of the condition, and 17% have less severe forms.