Frequency of Obesity and Concomittant Diseases in Patients with Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome (OSAS)

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the frequency of obesity in patients with various degrees of severity of OSAS, the prevalance of hypertension (HT), cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and diabetes mellitus (DM) coexisting with OSAS, and the relationship between obesity and these conditions. Material and Method: 729 subjects performed polysomnography. We retrospectively evaluated height, weight/body mass index (BMI), neck circumference (NC), polysomnographic findings: apnea/ hypopnea index (AHI), mean saturation value, minimum saturation value, maximum apnaeic period, sleep efficiency, Epworth sleepiness scale and concomitant diseases of the patients. Patients were divided into four groups: normal weight (BMI<25), overweight (25≤BMI<30), class I obesity (30≤BMI<40), class II obesity (40≤BMI).Results: While 49.3% of normal weight patients were diagnosed as primary snoring, only 15.5% of normal weight patients had a diagnosis of severe OSAS. On the other hand, 46.3% of class I obese patients and 72.7% of class II obese patients were diagnosed as severe OSAS. BMI and NC were found to influence the increase of AHI independently of age and gender (p<0.001). It was determined that 156 patients with HT (21.4%), 39 patients with CVD (5.3%) and 70 patients with DM (9.6%) had concomittant diseases. Among these diseases HT was found to be significantly related with obesity (p<0.001). In addition to AHI and age, increased BMI also influences the Epworth sleepiness scale score (p<0.001).Conclusion: Severe OSAS frequency in patients with >30 BMI was significantly high in our series. BMI and NC increase AHI independently of age and gender. Hypertension is found to be the most common concomitant disorder for both obesity and OSAS.