Incidence of obstructive sleep apnoea risk in surgical patients
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Quantifying the incidence of obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) in a surgical cohort attending pre-assessment using both the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) and the STOP-Bang questionnaire.
IRAS ID
148190
Contact name
Tim Vorster
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Research and Development Manager
Research summary
Obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) is a common condition with many cases remaining undiagnosed. It not only increases peri-operative risk but also longer-term morbidity and mortality. The identification of OSA is important in reducing overall peri-operative risk and therefore improve patient safety.
Surgical pre-assessment is a largely nurse led service in the United Kingdom with input from anaesthetists for more complex cases. At present there is no universal screening for OSA in surgical patients at Queen Victoria Hospital (QVH). Currently, patients who are deemed high risk, perhaps by having a raised body mass index (BMI), would then be screened using the STOP-Bang questionnaire. Those patients that score greater or equal to 4 in the STOP-Bang questionnaire will have a letter sent to their general practitioner (GP) requesting referral to a Sleep Disorders clinic. Screening patients somewhat arbitrarily has no evidence base and will undoubtedly fail to identify most patients with OSA. Universal screening is now supported by the American Society of Anesthesiologists.
This study will screen 1000 adult patients attending surgical pre-assessment at QVH for OSA using both the STOP-Bang questionnaire as well as the Epworth Sleepiness Scale. These are both well-validated screening tools which are fast, non-invasive and risk free.
Should either of the screening tools indicate a high risk of OSA then a standard letter will be sent to their GP advising referral to a sleep centre. This is identical to current practice with the patients who score 4 or more in the STOP-Bang questionnaire.
The results of the sleep studies will then be followed-up to establish how prevalent OSA is in this patient population and also look at what screening test is most sensitive.
This will establish whether routine screening is effective and whether more than one screening tool needs to be used concomitantly to improve sensitivity.REC name
London - London Bridge Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/LO/0782
Date of REC Opinion
16 Oct 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion