POLYSOMNOGRAPHY - ADDRESSING THE NEED FOR STANDARDS

The field of sleep disorders medicine is facing enormous challenges as it strives to gain recognition from the medical profession, the publi c and government. One of these challenges is to ensure that limited re sources for diagnosis are used wisely. The authors argue that the stan dards for polysomnography developed by the Canadian Sleep Society and the Canadian Thoracic Society (see plages 1673 to 1678 of this issue) will go a long way toward ensuring that this expensive resource is use d prudently. In the mean-time, more research is needed to determine va lid measures of the impact of sleep disorders and to establish the rel iability of different diagnostic methods.