Abstract
Introduction: Patients often complain of tiredness but it is difficult to appreciate whether this is true sleepiness. We have looked at the difference between tiredness on the STOPBANG Questionnaire and sleepiness on the self-completed Epworth Sleepiness Score (ESS) to identify if there is a subjective difference and how this relates to sleep physiology.
Methods: Patients referred for bariatric surgery who had an ESS, a STOPBANG Questionnaire assessment and a sleep study were assessed. Comparisons were made between the “tired” and “sleepy” groups.
Results: Out of the 113 patients, 73 were tired and 40 were not tired. 27 patients were sleepy and 75 were not sleepy. As anticipated, there is a strong relationship between tiredness and sleepiness (p=0.01). However neither tiredness nor sleepiness related to physiological parameters of nocturnal desaturation and Apnoea Hypopnea Index(AHI).
Tired (n=73) | Not-tired (n=40) | p value | |||
Mean | SD | Mean | SD | ||
ESS | 8.73 | 5.1 | 6.03 | 4.554 | 0.01 |
BMI | 45.32 | 8.21 | 46.13 | 8.263 | 0.62 |
ODI>4% | 26.38 | 23.40 | 25.09 | 23.81 | 0.538 |
Desaturation<90% | 10.36 | 16.52 | 11.41 | 17.65 | 0.961 |
Desaturation<85% | 1.9 | 4.79 | 4.15 | 10.81 | 0.325 |
AHI | 23.85 | 23.44 | 27.87 | 25.41 | 0.951 |
SD - Standard Deviation
ESS 11 (n=27) | ESS<11 (n=75) | p value | |||
Mean | SD | Mean | SD | ||
BMI | 45.15 | 8.21 | 45.66 | 8.332 | 0.524 |
ODI>4% | 28.82 | 25.69 | 25.34 | 23.64 | 0.652 |
Desaturation<90% | 14.37 | 20.78 | 9.95 | 15.81 | 0.226 |
Desaturation<85% | 3.54 | 6.66 | 2.70 | 8.30 | 0.206 |
AHI | 30.01 | 27.54 | 26.9 | 23.68 | 0.990 |
Conclusion: 1) There is a strong relationship between tiredness and sleepiness in this obese population.
2) There was no relationship between self-reported sleepiness or tiredness to the severity of sleep disordered breathing.
- Copyright ©the authors 2016