Recent weight gain in patients with newly diagnosed obstructive sleep apnea

Objective Patients with obstructive sleep apnea are often obese. Obesity ma y contribute to both sleep apnea itself and to the cardiovascular risk asso ciated with sleep apnea. Weight loss in obese patients with sleep apnea may alleviate symptoms and decrease the severity of sleep apnea. Whether patie nts with obstructive sleep apnea are indeed predisposed to recent weight ga in, as compared with similarly obese subjects without sleep apnea, is not k nown. Patients and methods We compared 1-year weight histories in 53 male and fem ale patients newly diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea, compared with 24 controls matched for gender, age, body mass index, and percent body fat. S leep apnea patients had never been treated. Control subjects were proven to be free of sleep-disordered breathing by overnight polysomnography. Results Patients with obstructive sleep apnea (n = 53) had a significant re cent weight gain of 7.4 +/- 1.5 kg compared with a weight loss of 0.5 +/- 1 .7 kg (P = 0.001) in similarly obese controls (n = 24), Male patients with obstructive sleep apnea (n = 28) had a history of significant weight gain ( 6.8 +/- 2.3 kg) over the year preceding the study compared with male contro l subjects (n = 13), in whom average weight fell by 0.58 +/- 2.4 kg (P = 0. 03). Female patients (n = 25) with obstructive sleep apnea had an 8.0 +/- 1 .9 kg weight gain compared with female controls (n = 11) who had a history of weight loss of 0.46 +/- 2.6 kg (P = 0.02). Conclusion These findings support the concept that patients with obstructiv e sleep apnea may be susceptible to increasing obesity in the period preced ing the diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnea, J Hypertens 1999, 17:1297-130 0 (C) Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.