SCREENING OBSTRUCTIVE SLEEP-APNEA SYNDROME BY HOME VIDEOTAPE RECORDING IN CHILDREN

Overnight polysomnography (PSG) has been used to diagnose and assess t he severity of obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome (OSAS) in children, T he aim of this study was to determine whether home video-recording of children during sleep may be used for screening OSAS. In 58 children s uspected of having OSAS, PSG results were compared with the correspond ing analyses of 30 min video-recordings of each child sleeping at home , The video-recordings were evaluated by: 1) overall investigator's cl inical judgement; and 2) a scoring system based on noisy breathing, mo vements, waking episodes, apnoea, chest retractions and mouth breathin g. PSG results were highly correlated with the video test results, wit h agreement in 49 out of 58 (84%). In 36 of the 58 children, the PSG w as abnormal compared with 41 out of 58 abnormal video tests. The sensi tivity of the overall investigator judgement of video test was 94% (34 out of 36) and the specificity 68% (15 out of 22), Video scores >10 w ere highly predictive of OSAS, whilst scores <5 were associated with n ormality, Using a stepwise logistic regression analysis, each of the s coring variables was tested against the PSG results and an equation wa s formulated for predicting PSG by the video test. The equation predic ted PSG results in 49 out of 58 (84%) cases. Thirty minutes of home vi deo-recordings during sleep is a reliable screening method for obstruc tive sleep apnoea syndrome in children. This technique may, thus, impr ove patient selection for polysomnography.