Upper airway findings in patients with nocturnal breathing disorders

This prospective open study was performed to examine the relation between pathologic findings of the upper respiratory tract and the types of noncentral sleep disorders (rhonchopathy, obstructive sleep apnea). 312 men and 274 women aged between 35-75 years attended our outpatient department for relief of their nocturnal breathing disorder. About 1/3 of the patients suffered only of habitual rhonchopathy and 2/3 were obstructive. No findings of the head and neck examination could predict the degree of oxygen desaturation, although pathologies of the nose (73.68%), the soft palate (94.1%) and narrowing of the oro- and hypopharynx (74.19%) were very common in patients with sleep disorder. At least one pathology could be found in every patients. The more pathologies were found the higher was the risk of obstructive sleep apnoea with desaturation below 70%. Unrelated tonsillectomy (51.36%) did not prevent nocturnal breathing disorders.