Obstructive sleep apnea without obesity

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is more common in obese individuals. Less is known about OSA in non-obese persons. This study looked at characteristics of OSA in non-obese people and compared them to OSA in obese people. In the introduction, the authors mention that non-obese individuals make up at least 20% of the adult OSA population. The authors also discussed that one reason non-obese people may have OSA is due to a low respiratory arousal threshold. This means that non-obese people may wake up more easily when their breathing tube collapses. In the study, the authors used information from sleep studies to estimate respiratory arousal threshold. The results showed that 25% of their patients were non-obese. And a higher proportion of non-obese patients had a low respiratory arousal threshold. Also CPAP usage was less in non-obese patients than obese patients. The authors concluded that non-obese patients may respond less to conventional OSA therapies (like CPAP) and that research is needed to discover alternative ways of treating OSA in non-obese patients.