Using positive airway pressure therapy, as directed, can significantly increase sleep apnea patients’ chances of living longer, according to a late-breaking abstract presented today at the virtual European Respiratory Society (ERS) International Congress 2021 and supported by ResMed.
The landmark ALASKA study, “CPAP Termination and All-Cause Mortality: a French Nationwide Database Analysis,” concluded people with obstructive sleep apnea who continued PAP therapy were 39% more likely to survive than OSA patients who didn’t.1 Researchers observed over 176,000 people in France with sleep apnea over a three-year period. Study authors say the survival rate gap remained significant when accounting for patients’ ages, overall health, other pre-existing conditions, and causes of death.
“Treating sleep apnea with PAP therapy may help you live longer; that’s the key takeaway here for people with sleep apnea and their doctors,” said Adam Benjafield, study co-author and ResMed Vice President of Medical Affairs. “This finding underscores how critical it is to identify the hundreds of millions of people worldwide whose sleep apnea is undiagnosed and untreated.”
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An estimated 936 million people worldwide have sleep apnea2 – including over 175 million Europeans – but over 80% remain undiagnosed.3
The ALASKA study was conducted in partnership with Professor Jean-Louis Pépin; universities of Grenoble, San Diego, and Sydney; Sêmeia; and other researchers from ResMed’s industry-academia collaboration medXcloud.
1 Pepin JL et al. “CPAP termination and all-cause mortality: a French nationwide database analysis.” ERS abstract, 2021
2 Benjafield AV et al. Lancet Resp Care 2019
3 Young T et al. Sleep 1997
4 Benjafield AV et al. “An estimate of the European prevalence of COPD in 2050.” ERS abstract, 2021
Source: ResMed, press release and image
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