The Obstructive Sleep Apnea Special - What Sleep Wants - Physicians

The magical words you will often hear in your GP office:

"I have obstructive sleep apnea, and I don't want to keep using my CPAP. What are my options?"

This sleep disorder researcher has been doing the work for for patients and you. Unusual, I know, but stay with me. Your patients, receiving an obstructive sleep apnea diagnosis, are often facing a rubber-stamp diagnosis: CPAP. As you know, compliance is not great; it feels intrusive, will often be dismissed or discontinued.

From your point of view, a few things are important. Is it really clear where the obstruction sits, and has he right treatment been checked/applied?

I love getting to the point for you. Patients tend to use AI and the internet, but such approaches are often associated with feeling doomed. However, the right details are either behind paywalls or require 100s of Dollars in books, education and understanding the medical background and current assumptions. There are indirect approaches, checking if the path toward the obstruction is cleared so far, and then check what to do about the obstruction itself. For instance, difficulties in breathing caused by polyps hinder, but will not improve sleep apnea in itself.

Well, your patient requires a redo. Here's how this works.

Step 1: Your patient may initially check what details they have handy about their diagnosis, what are the locations, if several? Of unclear, that is fine, too. What treatment options have been considered so far?

Step 2: The questionnaire is there to get you started. Once filled out, you both may head back to the main document. There, full guidance on ideal diagnostic tools has been provided, including what's hot and what's not. This is important if the diagnosis took place and circumstances have changed. Now is the moment to refer to a sleep physician to look into the details.

Step 3: Once the details of their specific case are clear, they may use the main document is there to discuss options with their sleep physician. At this stage, you may only get involved if the sleep physician will not consider looking into different diagnostic tools, treatment options, or changes in the patient to be taken into account. The sleep physician is getting the latest on what we know, based on classic resources, but research findings for medical consideration go way beyond Principles and Practice of Sleep Medicine, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. Where available, success rates have been added, also taking into consideration that practitioners have preferred methods and tools.

Sounds good, doesn't it?