The question: Might people who have a pattern of disrupted sleep known as sleep apnea be more likely to die prematurely?
This study: It involved 1,522 people (average age, 48), whose sleep was tested in a sleep lab at the start of the study. In the following 14 years, 80 participants died. Those who had severe sleep apnea (30 breath disruptions an hour), based on the sleep-lab testing, were three times more likely to have died than people who recorded no disrupted breathing.
Who may be affected? People with sleep apnea, marked by repeated pauses of 10 seconds or so in breathing during sleep. An estimated 12 million people in the United States have been found to have the disorder, but as many as 10 million more may be unaware that they have it.
Caveats: Sleep-apnea diagnosis was based on one night of testing. The study did not evaluate treatments for the disorder or their effect on mortality.
Find this study: August issue of Sleep.
Learn more: www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health (use "A to Z Index") and www.sleepeducation.com.
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