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Ambulatory Management of Obstructive Sleep Apnea without Polysomnography
- Konrad E. Bloch, MD;
- Oliver Senn, MD;
- Thomas Brack, MD; and
- Erich W. Russi, MD
- From University Hospital of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
TO THE EDITOR:
Mulgrew and colleagues (1) propose an ambulatory diagnostic–therapeutic algorithm for the obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) syndrome. Patients with a very high likelihood of the OSA syndrome, based on a questionnaire and an ambulatory polygraphic sleep study, were treated with autoadjusted continuous positive airway pressure (auto-CPAP) without confirmation of the diagnosis by polysomnography. Compared with a control group undergoing diagnostic in-laboratory polysomnography, the treatment group, managed according to the ambulatory algorithm, had a similar outcome after 3 months—that is, a median apnea–hypopnea index on CPAP of 2.5 versus 3.2 …
