Sleep Apnea

A case-control study of 120 adults finds a history of COVID-19 leaves obstructive sleep apnea physiology largely intact, apart from a heightened breathing response that follows brief arousals from sleep.

A new AI model built from 10,000 sleep studies sorts patients into five risk tiers for death, heart disease, and cognitive decline — catching danger signals invisible to the standard apnea severity score, and predicting outcomes equally well in men and women.

Apnimed raised $192 million in an upsized Nasdaq IPO to fund the launch of AD109, an oral therapy that cut breathing interruptions by nearly half in Phase 3 trials, as the company awaits an FDA decision expected in February 2027.

The American College of Chest Physicians has published its first clinical practice guideline devoted entirely to obstructive sleep apnea in pregnancy, offering nine specific recommendations on screening, diagnostic thresholds, CPAP use, and postpartum retesting — an effort to standardize care for a condition tied to preeclampsia, gestational diabetes, and preterm birth.

Patients who received a hypoglossal nerve stimulator for sleep apnea had an 81% lower hazard of developing diabetes and a 51% lower hazard of developing hypertension after two years, a study of nearly 7,200 patients found — but the benefit only appeared after an initial period with no advantage at all.

A public pediatric sleep clinic in São Paulo has designed an interdisciplinary program — combining psychoeducation, gradual mask desensitization, and telehealth follow-ups — to help children with sleep apnea adhere to PAP therapy. The study lays out how to make it work within the constraints of Brazil's universal health system.

The fourth edition of São Paulo's landmark EPISONO study found obstructive sleep apnea in 37% of adults — up from about 33% a decade earlier — using full-night sleep-lab testing on a representative sample of the city. Aging, higher body mass, and being male were the strongest risk factors.

A Monash University study of 2,795 cognitively unimpaired adults ages 40 to 70 found obstructive sleep apnea associated with measurably poorer memory and higher dementia risk scores in midlife — an association that did not hold for participants whose apnea was being treated.

A 100-patient trial found that a single night of polysomnography can misclassify obstructive sleep apnea severity, especially in patients who sleep worse than usual in an unfamiliar lab. Three months of low-burden home monitoring told a different, more accurate story.

The FDA has accepted Apnimed's new drug application for AD109, a once-nightly pill for obstructive sleep apnea, and set a target decision date of February 28, 2027 — the clearest signal yet that the first oral treatment could reach patients next year.

The story of OSCAR — the free, open-source software that lets sleep apnea patients see the detailed CPAP data their manufacturers' apps hide — begins with an Australian developer who just wanted to read his own numbers.

A 10-year study tracking 777 older adults with obstructive sleep apnea found that those who used CPAP showed significantly slower cognitive decline than those who did not — suggesting the breathing device may protect brain function during aging.

A $14 million federally funded clinical trial will compare CPAP, mandibular advancement devices, and a pharmacological combination head-to-head in 2,400 patients — the largest comparative effectiveness study ever conducted for obstructive sleep apnea.

A large prospective study published in Chest finds that each interquartile-range increase in PM2.5 exposure raises sleep apnea risk by 16%, with carriers of the FTO obesity gene variant facing disproportionately higher vulnerability — adding air quality to the growing list of modifiable sleep apnea risk factors.

A 2026 meta-analysis in Sleep and Breathing pooled data from four randomized trials and found that GLP-1 receptor agonists reduce the apnea-hypopnea index by nearly 14 events per hour on average — with tirzepatide alone cutting it by 24.

A study presented at ASM Microbe 2026 found that eliminating a single bile acid receptor in mice abolished the arterial plaque buildup caused by sleep apnea-like conditions — revealing a gut-driven mechanism that could eventually lead to targeted therapies for the millions of patients at cardiovascular risk.

A study of more than 132,000 sleep apnea patients found that 51% did not meet Medicare adherence criteria within 90 days, but more than a third of those patients were still using CPAP a year later — raising questions about insurance policies that cut off coverage based on early struggles.

A study of 1,206 adults using full overnight polysomnography found that both current smokers and former smokers had approximately 75% greater odds of more severe obstructive sleep apnea compared to people who never smoked — suggesting that airway changes from smoking persist years after quitting.

A meta-analysis of more than 13,000 adults found that people with obstructive sleep apnea are 85% more likely to develop sarcopenia — and CT imaging studies show their muscles may be infiltrated with fat even when they appear normal in size.

Apnimed has secured $300 million through two financing deals as it prepares to submit a new drug application to the FDA for AD109, a once-nightly pill that reduced breathing interruptions by up to 56% in clinical trials.