This Article  • References  • Full text PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in JAMA  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Samuel T. Kuna, MD; Giuseppe Sant'Ambrogio, MD
University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston

JAMA. 1992;267(9):1207.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

In Reply.

—Dr Woodcock's data do not support the conclusion that nasal airway resistance is unlikely to be important in the causation of OSA. As emphasized in our article, upper airway closure during sleep can be caused by changes in pharyngeal closing pressure, pharyngeal muscle force, and/or pharyngeal suction force. While not all OSA patients have abnormally high nasal airway resistance, individuals with an abnormally high nasal airway resistance from nasal septal deviation, nasal polyps, or chronic nasal congestion, are at increased risk of developing upper airway closure during sleep.^1-3 Abnormally high upstream resistance increases transmission of subatmospheric intrathoracic pressure into the potentially collapsible pharyngeal airway. Improvement in OSA has been reported with correction of abnormally high nasal airway resistance.⁴ However, correction of abnormally high nasal airway resistance may not improve OSA depending on pharyngeal closing pressure and pharyngeal muscle force. Treatment of these latter patients may be . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?