
"Understanding these mechanisms could change the way that sleep apnea clinical trials are designed and what is measured in clinical practice," said Marishka K. The authors noted the findings have the potential to change how sleep apnea is assessed but need to be validated through future studies. "The connections are less explained by obesity or another factor." "That's something that makes this metric specific to sleep apnea," said Gonzalo Labarca, M.D., a study author and an instructor in medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Sudden awakenings weren't associated with cardiovascular outcomes in MESA, but were linked with cardiovascular-related deaths in MrOS. Similar findings for predicting premature death based on hypoxic and ventilatory burden were also observed.

Airway obstruction, measured by a full or partial closing of the airways, accounted for 38% of observed risks in MESA and for 12% in MrOS.

In MrOS, the observed increased risk was 13%. Approximately 110 participants in MESA and 382 in MrOS experienced a primary cardiovascular event.įor every measure of observed reduction in blood oxygen levels, or hypoxic burden, a person in MESA had a 45% increased associated risk for having a primary cardiovascular event.

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During this time, participants completed medical check-ins and sleep assessments ( 5 ✔ ✔Trusted Source MESA included data from 1,973 men and women, with an average age of 67, who were followed for about seven years. Through MrOS, 2,627 men, with an average age of 76, were followed for about nine to 12 years. While sleep apnea severity is defined as how many times the airways become blocked during an hour of sleep, this study sought to better characterize underlying mechanisms of obstructive sleep apnea and identify those that strongly predict increased cardiovascular risks.
