TITLE:
Gender Differences in Rapid Eye Movement-Related Sleep Disordered Breathing
AUTHORS:
Minjung Youn, Joo Young Kwon, Kyu Sun Lee, Jung Hyun Park, Hyang Woon Lee
KEYWORDS:
Women, Sleep Disordered Breathing, Obstructive Sleep Apnea, Rapid Eye Movement Sleep, Apnea-Hypopnea Index
JOURNAL NAME:
Health,
Vol.7 No.1,
January
19,
2015
ABSTRACT: Sleep disordered breathing (SDB) is an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease. It is known to be associated more frequently with men than women, particularly in the premenopausal age range. The goal of this study is to evaluate gender differences among Korean patients diagnosed with SBD. This study included 309 patients who visited our Sleep Clinic due to sleep-related symptoms and were diagnosed with SDB by overnight polysomnography (PSG). We analyzed age, gender, body mass index, various PSG indices including sleep stages, apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) and AHI ratio in rapid eye movement (REM) versus non-REM (NREM) sleep stages (R:N ratio). Of those 309 patients diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea, 217 (70.2%) were men (mean age 51.05 ± 12.64 years) and 92 (29.8%) were women (mean age 64.53 ± 10.43 years). The mean AHI during total sleep time was 30.34 ± 21.17 in men and 21.47 ± 17.14 in women (P P P = 0.402). REM SDB with R:N ratio higher than 2.0 was more frequently observed in women than in men, 34.8% (32/92) of women, compared with 11.9% (26/217) in men (P 60 years old. These findings suggest the possibility of different pathophysiologic mechanisms of SDB between genders and also between NREM versus REM sleep, which can be partly explained by the influence of female sex hormones.