Symptoms Of Sleep-Disordered Breathing Common Among Adolescents

Main Category: Sleep / Sleep Disorders / Insomnia
Article Date: 06 Sep 2006 - 0:00 PDT

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Sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) has symptoms that appear to be common among adolescents, which can lead to both short- and long-term adverse problems if left untreated, including excessive daytime sleepiness, poor academic performance and ADHD, according to a study published in the September 1st issue of the journal SLEEP.

Eric O. Johnson, PhD, of Research Triangle Institute International in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, studied 1,014 adolescents between 13-16 years of age and a paired parent. It was discovered that more than 20 percent of the adolescents snored at least a few nights per month and six percent snored every or nearly every night. Furthermore, apnea-like symptoms affected from 2.5 percent to 6.1 percent of adolescents. The prevalence of weekly SDB was six percent, according to both adolescent and parental report, and was twice as likely among African Americans as Caucasians.

"This estimated prevalence of SDB is a somewhat higher than recent SDB estimates from population-based studies of children using traditional polysomnography clinical thresholds and about the same as those found in adults in Western countries, suggesting that this self-report measure, while lacking the validity of polysomnography, is not an unrealistic one for adolescents," wrote Johnson.

SDB is a group of disorders characterized by abnormalities of pauses in breathing or the quantity of ventilation during sleep. Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a condition that causes your body to stop breathing during sleep, and occurs when the tissue in the back of the throat collapses and blocks the airway, keeping air from getting into the lungs, is the most common such disorder. OSA, although more common in men and women of any age, may be diagnosed in those children with large tonsils.

Another common sleep-related breathing disorder is snoring, a symptom of increased upper airway resistance during sleep, which is primarily found in both men and women, but can also be found in 10 to 12 percent of children and adolescents.

Persons thinking they might have a sleep disorder are encouraged to consult with their primary care physician, who will determine whether a visit to a sleep specialist is necessary.

SLEEP is the official journal of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies, LLC, a joint venture of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Sleep Research Society.

http://www.Sleepeducation.com, a Web site maintained by the AASM, provides information about the various sleep disorders that exist, the forms of treatment available, recent news on the topic of sleep, sleep studies that have been conducted and a listing of sleep centers.

American Academy of Sleep Medicine
http://www.aasmnet.org