OSA Awareness Resources

Healthcare professionals can easily integrate care for OSA into their practice with the use of these practice resources. Learn more about the importance of screening, utilize algorithms that detail the path from screening to treatment or referral, and access practical tools for OSA care, such as an easy-to-use screening tool, template referral form, and treatment tips.

Brief provider videos

Importance of Screening for Sleep Apnea
Primary care is the front door to our health systems. A very small percentage of patients with sleep-related symptoms who regularly visit a primary care clinician report their symptoms to their clinician without being asked about sleep. So, just asking the right questions can go a long way in screening for obstructive sleep apnea. Take a look at this brief video to learn how to initiate conversations about sleep apnea.

Initiating the Sleep Apnea Conversation
It is imperative for primary and family care providers, cardiologists, bariatric surgeons, endocrinologists, and other health care professionals to identify patients with symptoms of OSA. See how obstructive sleep apnea symptoms are common with several comorbid conditions in this brief video.

Under diagnosis of sleep apnea in women
The reported prevalence and severity of obstructive sleep apnea in women is lower, compared with men, but the consequences of the disease are the same. Interpretation of the STOP-BANG questionnaire is nuanced for women because the gender question response is 0. Nevertheless, the tool is still useful for prediction of moderate-to-severe disease. Given the nature of its questions, a lower score may be predictive of more severe OSA in women. Watch this brief video to see how women present with atypical symptoms, and how to ask them about their sleep.

Clinical vignettes

Clinical vignettes are case reports that provide insight into clinical practice. In this series, expert clinicians respond to adapted patient scenarios as they would emerge in clinical practice to demonstrate appropriate care pathways for patients with OSA. The clinician responds as new information is presented, sharing his or her reasoning with the reader. Our aim is to promote appropriate medical care. While OSA often goes undiagnosed, known (and sometimes obscure) risk factors, symptoms and assessment tools can help primary care physicians and other healthcare professionals identify the disease.

OSA and Chronic Cough
A 61-year-old female of the Te-Moak Tribe of western Shoshone Indians of Nevada visited the local Southern Bands Health Center with a 5-year history of chronic dry cough that was worse at night and during the winter months. Read this case to learn more about how chronic cough can be the sole presenting symptom for some patients with obstructive sleep apnea, and how the patient’s primary care physician recognized confounding factors leading to a good clinical and objective response to CPAP therapy.

Treating OSA with Oral Appliance
A 54-year-old female patient, presented with complaints of waking up with frequent headaches, fatigue, inability to concentrate, anxiety and mood swings. Although diagnosed as having mild OSA in the past, the patient is extremely symptomatic. She had been prescribed a CPAP but was non-compliant. Read this case to learn more about this patient, her medical history and how a multi-disciplinary approach improved the patient’s quality of life and overall health status outcome.

OSA and Transgender Therapy
A 35-year-old transgender man (assigned female at birth) presented to the primary care clinic for his annual physical visit. He wanted to discuss his persistent snoring and excessive daytime sleepiness that he has been experiencing recently. Read this case to learn more about this patient, his medical history, how the primary care provider recognized that exogenous testosterone administered for gender reassignment can cause sleep apnea and managed his complaints, and the final outcome of the case.

OSA and Hemorrhagic Stroke
A 32-year-old Chinese man presented to the emergency room with weakness and inability to walk, resulting in a fall. Read this case to learn more about this patient, his medical history, how further investigations, and testing helped the emergency physician identify sleep apnea as the cause of his stroke followed by treatment options.

OSA and Color Vision Deficit
A 45-year-old male of African American descent presented to his primary care physician’s office for his six-month checkup. He has had type 2 diabetes for 5 years. He complains that he has been seeing all objects with a greenish tinge in both eyes for a month. Read this case to learn more about this patient, his medical history, how the primary care provider highlights the need to keep in mind the presence of OSA in diabetic patients who can present with color vision problems, and final outcome of the case.

OSA and Heart Disease
A 42-year-old female of Asian descent was admitted to the ward with complaints of dyspnea and squeezing chest pain without radiation during mild to moderate physical activity, pitting edema of the lower extremities, nocturia and treatment for resistant arterial hypertension (AH). Read this case to learn more about this patient, her medical history, how the primary care provider expanded the questioning to dig deeper, additional testing performed and final outcome of the case.  

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