About this Research Topic
Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) is a common condition with a high impact on health care. The estimated prevalence of OSA ranges between 20-40%, and more than one billion patients are at risk of OSA worldwide. Current OSA diagnosis is achieved by the Apnea-Hypopnea index (AHI), and moderate to severe OSA is strongly associated with worse outcomes. Although snoring, witnessed apnea's, and excessive sleepiness during the day are the main OSA-related symptoms, OSA is frequently non-diagnosed in clinics, and therefore, undertreated.
Additionally, OSA is widely associated with various systemic comorbidities related to an increased risk of poor incident outcomes at follow-up, especially in non-sleepy patients. The main OSA – related comorbidities are cardiovascular disease, cardiometabolic issues, increased risk of prevalent and incident cognitive impairment and cancer diagnosis.
Here, a precision-medicine approach including the different OSA phenotypes, and the burden of comorbidities is a major issue for clinicians to improve health outcomes. According to clinical guidelines, the gold standard treatment for moderate to severe OSA is continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). However, randomized controlled trials aimed to explore the efficacy of CPAP on OSA comorbidities have failed in shown significant efficacy to improve these outcomes. A potential explanation for these non-consistent results is the inadequate selection of patients for these trials using AHI. Therefore, identifying novel measures including genetics, biomarkers, clinical and signals derived from sleep study tests to identify high-risk OSA phenotypes of worse health outcomes are relevant.
This Research Topic aims to provide a forum to advance research on OSA and its association with systemic comorbidities. We plan to include original research, clinical trials, mini review, opinion and systematic reviews including clinical and translational aspects of OSA such as the physiological pathways, genetics, biomarkers, clinical features, and treatments options focusing on, but not limited to the following topics:
• Studies focusing on OSA and cardiovascular outcomes (cardiovascular mortality, acute myocardial infarction, stroke, heart failure, atrial fibrillation, others)
• Studies focusing on OSA and arterial hypertension (with emphasis on resistant and refractory hypertension)
• Studies focusing on OSA and metabolic impairment (Obesity, Metabolic syndrome, Dyslipidaemia, Diabetes Mellitus, Fatty liver disease)
• Studies focusing on OSA and neurocognitive impairment (mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer disease, other dementias)
Additionally, OSA is widely associated with various systemic comorbidities related to an increased risk of poor incident outcomes at follow-up, especially in non-sleepy patients. The main OSA – related comorbidities are cardiovascular disease, cardiometabolic issues, increased risk of prevalent and incident cognitive impairment and cancer diagnosis.
Here, a precision-medicine approach including the different OSA phenotypes, and the burden of comorbidities is a major issue for clinicians to improve health outcomes. According to clinical guidelines, the gold standard treatment for moderate to severe OSA is continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). However, randomized controlled trials aimed to explore the efficacy of CPAP on OSA comorbidities have failed in shown significant efficacy to improve these outcomes. A potential explanation for these non-consistent results is the inadequate selection of patients for these trials using AHI. Therefore, identifying novel measures including genetics, biomarkers, clinical and signals derived from sleep study tests to identify high-risk OSA phenotypes of worse health outcomes are relevant.
This Research Topic aims to provide a forum to advance research on OSA and its association with systemic comorbidities. We plan to include original research, clinical trials, mini review, opinion and systematic reviews including clinical and translational aspects of OSA such as the physiological pathways, genetics, biomarkers, clinical features, and treatments options focusing on, but not limited to the following topics:
• Studies focusing on OSA and cardiovascular outcomes (cardiovascular mortality, acute myocardial infarction, stroke, heart failure, atrial fibrillation, others)
• Studies focusing on OSA and arterial hypertension (with emphasis on resistant and refractory hypertension)
• Studies focusing on OSA and metabolic impairment (Obesity, Metabolic syndrome, Dyslipidaemia, Diabetes Mellitus, Fatty liver disease)
• Studies focusing on OSA and neurocognitive impairment (mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer disease, other dementias)
Keywords: Sleep Apnea, Cardiovascular, Neurocognitive, Metabolic, Precision Medicine, Pulmonary Medicine
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