Personalizing sleep apnea care

[摘要] Personalized medicine, an in-vogue term that refers to grouping patients into subcategories that provide clinical utility, is not a new strategy but rather one that has long been intrinsic to clinical practice. Let us explore how this term applies to sleep apnea care. Examples of the current application of personalized medicine in the management of obstructive sleep apnea include assessing the following: personal characteristics to establish pretest probability to decide whether to perform a home sleep apnea test; sleep apnea severity from sleep testing to counsel a patient on long-term cardiovascular risk; and sleep symptomology to determine whether continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) therapy is warranted in patients with mild disease. Notwithstanding these examples, many areas of practice remain under-personalized because of ignorance regarding which characteristics identify subgroups that would benefit from tailored approaches. Greater personalization could improve risk assessment for the consequences of untreated obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and lead to better treatment strategies.

[学科分类] 生理学