NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – People with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) may find nighttime treatment with a pressurized breathing machine cumbersome, but it pays off: continuous positive airway pressure therapy — CPAP, as it’s called — does lower the rate of heart-related deaths in such patients, researchers have shown.
People with OSA suffer frequent, short periods during sleep when they stop breathing. The condition is linked to high blood pressure and other heart conditions.
The current findings, Dr. Walter T. McNicholas told Reuters Health, “provide a strong basis for physicians to encourage compliance with CPAP in patients with OSA, particularly in severe cases, based on the strong likelihood that such patients, if untreated, are at substantially higher risk of cardiovascular complications,”
