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BACKGROUND Oral myofunctional therapy (MFT) is an effective treatment for mild-to-moderate obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) in middle-aged patients. However, few reports have described its use in elderly patients with moderate and severe OSA. Moreover, no studies have examined the relationship between changes in tongue pressure with MFT and the severity of OSA. OBJECTIVE We conducted an interventional study using MFT to evaluate the effect of MFT on middle-to-senior-aged patients with moderate or severe OSA and compared changes in apnoea-hypopnea index (AHI) and tongue pressure. METHODS Thirty-two OSA patients (≥45 years) treated with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) were included. MFT was performed in parallel with CPAP. Three days after CPAP discontinuation, polysomnographies were performed and tongue pressures were measured before and after MFT. RESULTS Patients were 69.3 ± 1.5 years old. After 6 months of MFT, AHI decreased significantly from 34.7 to 29.0/h (P = .03), while tongue pressure significantly increased from 35.9 to 45.6 kPa (P

It was shown in a previous cohort study that men with internal carotid artery (ICA) plaque, defined as focal wall thickness of ≥ 1.5 mm, had a threefold higher risk of stroke than those without plaque. We examined the relationship between arousal indices and sleep stages in patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) and carotid atherosclerosis. Carotid atherosclerosis severity was evaluated using the maximal carotid wall intima-media thickness of the ICA (ICA-maxIMT) and plaque in 83 patients with OSAS. The ICA-maxIMT values were positively correlated with the apnea hypopnea index (AHI) (ρ = 0.294, P = 0.007), arousal index (ρ = 0.289, P = 0.008), oxygen desaturation index (ρ = 0.298, P = 0.006), percentage of visually scored total sleep time spent in nocturnal oxygen saturation

Background and objectives The pathophysiologic aspects of parasympathetic nerve (PN) function during sleep in patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) studied by classical power spectrum analysis on heart rate variability (HRV) are highly controversial. The controversy is attributed to methodologic concerns, such as poor time resolution involved in power spectrum analysis. We aimed to establish the appropriate method for the investigation of PN function in OSA patients with apneas and hypopneas using instantaneous time–frequency analysis with complex demodulation (CD) and sufficient time resolution. Methods A total of 30 patients with PSG-confirmed mild to severe OSA were recruited for the analysis of frequency spectra contained in R-R intervals (RRI) of overnight electrocardiograph (ECG) tracings. High-frequency (HF) domains ranging between 0.15 and 0.40 Hz were selected for analysis. Among these domains, the HF domain with the maximum instantaneous amplitude was defined as the main HF peak and was used as the surrogate marker of PN discharge. Based on density spectrum array (DSA) map for main HF peak constructed with a time scale of 1 s and a frequency resolution of 0.002 Hz (HF-DSA map), the shift in central frequency (CF) of main HF peak over time was continuously monitored. When the main HF peak with the same CF lasted for more than 20 s or 5 min on HF-DSA map, the PN function was considered to be stable or very stable. The measurements were then repeated after continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) treatment. Results The extent of PN-evoked modulation of RRI was enhanced in nonrapid eye movement (NREM) sleep, though the stability was reduced in both NREM and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. These peculiar behaviors of PN function were reversed by CPAP treatment. Conclusion We found that instantaneous time–frequency analysis allowed estimation of transitional changes in PN function during sleep in OSA patients.