Obstructive sleep apnea in professional rugby league athletes: An exploratory study

To explore the prevalence of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) within a professional rugby league team and determine associations of OSA with ethnicity, positional group, and physical characteristics.

Observational prospective cohort study.

Twenty-two professional rugby league athletes underwent one night of home-based polysomnography with apnea-hypopnea index (AHI), rapid eye movement (REM)_AHI, non-REM_AHI and supine_AHI determined to indicate OSA. Linear models were used to assess if playing position (back or forward) or ethnicity (European-Australian or Polynesian) influenced AHI, REM_AHI, non-REM_AHI and supine_AHI. Models were also built to determine differences according to body composition.

Seven athletes were classified with mild OSA (6 forwards and 1 back, 3 European-Australians, and 4 Polynesians) and three with moderate OSA (2 forwards and 1 back, 3 Polynesians). When considering ethnicity, differences were observed between Polynesians and European-Australians for REM_AHI (ES=0.90, p=0.02). Increased body mass index (BMI) was associated with a moderate increase in AHI (r=0.38, p=0.04) and non-REM_AHI (r=0.36, p=0.05), while higher skinfold thickness moderately related to a higher AHI (r=0.40, p=0.05) non-REM_AHI (r=0.47, p=0.02), and supine_AHI (r=0.41, p=0.04).

This exploratory study found 10 cases of OSA. Polynesian athletes and athletes classified as forwards constituted the majority of reported cases, suggesting their susceptibility to OSA. Furthermore, the data suggests that athletes with greater BMI and skinfold thickness may be predisposed to OSA.