State-related changes in breathing. Are we missing sleep-disordered breathing syndromes in veterinary patients?

In recent decades, treatment of sleep disorders has developed rapidly. Prevalent and severe sleep disorders affecting respiration have been discovered in clinical sleep disorders centers. Although sleep studies are not currently, and may never become, a clinical tool for veterinarians, evidence from investigative work shows that dogs, at least, can suffer from "sleep-disordered breathing" syndromes similar to those affecting humans. The physiology and pathophysiology of sleep and breathing are strikingly similar in dogs and humans.