Nature and Science of Sleep (Mar 2022)

Evaluation of Vestibular Function in Patients Affected by Obstructive Sleep Apnea Performing Functional Head Impulse Test (fHIT)

  • Pace A,
  • Milani A,
  • Rossetti V,
  • Iannella G,
  • Maniaci A,
  • Cocuzza S,
  • Alunni Fegatelli D,
  • Vestri A,
  • Magliulo G

Journal volume & issue
Vol. Volume 14
pp. 475 – 482

Abstract

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Annalisa Pace,1,2 Alessandro Milani,1 Valeria Rossetti,1 Giannicola Iannella,1– 3 Antonino Maniaci,4 Salvatore Cocuzza,4 Danilo Alunni Fegatelli,5 Annarita Vestri,5 Giuseppe Magliulo1 1Organi di Senso Department, Sapienza University, Rome, Italy; 2Scienze Chirurgiche Department, Sapienza University, Rome, Italy; 3Department of Head-Neck Surgery, Morgagni Pierantoni Hospital, Forlì, Italy; 4Otorinolaringoiatria Department, University of Catania, Catania, Italy; 5Department of Public Health and Infectious Diseases, Sapienza University, Rome, ItalyCorrespondence: Annalisa Pace, Organi di Senso Department, Sapienza University, Viale dell’Università 33 Rome, 00165, Italy, Tel +393203581431, Fax +390649976817, Email [email protected]: Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) is a common disease with significantly related complications. Since a connection between the vestibular nucleus and sleep regulator pathways has been demonstrated, vestibular evaluation in OSA patients was partially studied and none used functional head impulse test (fHIT) for this purpose. This paper aimed at evaluating the vestibular function in patients affected by OSA using fHIT, selecting patients who did not present any other related to cardiovascular, neurological, or metabolic diseases.Patients and Methods: Patients enrolled had a diagnosis of OSA by polysomnography type III and were cataloged according to American Association of Sleep Medicine criteria. Each patient underwent fHIT. Statistical significance was set at 0.05.Results: A total of 85 patients were enrolled in the study of which 50 had a diagnosis of OSA and were included in the case group, while 35 belonged to the control group. In 88.6% of subjects of the case group was evidenced a vestibular impairment with a substantial difference between the two study groups (p< 0.05).Conclusion: The results show that the incidence of vestibular lesions in patients with obstructive sleep apnoea is underestimated and that fHIT can identify these lesions early.Keywords: obstructive sleep apnea, vestibular system, functional head impulse test, vestibular ocular reflex, sleep regulator pathways

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