Dr Dimitrios Jim Papadopoulos, Sleep Medicine Physician
Learning Objectives:
- Understand the health burden of snoring and sleep difficulties in children
- Understand the symptoms, signs and tests which help us evaluate snoring and sleep difficulties in children
- Understand the importance of a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach to the diagnosis and management of snoring and sleep difficulties in children
Disordered sleep is prevalent, affecting 30% of children. In fact some subgroups of children have an even higher chance of having sleep problems eg children with Developmental Delay/Disability (60%), Autistic Spectrum Disorder (80%) Down Syndrome (80% have OSA). Disordered sleep affects mood, behaviour and cognition and has an adverse impact on the family. Adverse intellectual impacts may be irreversible. Snoring, even if non-vibratory (heavy breathing) can indicate the presence of underlying Obstructive Sleep Apnoea (OSA), Allergic Rhinitis, Gastro-oesophageal Reflux Disease and/or structural anomalies.
These are also important contributors to adverse dentofacial outcomes. We all know that snoring even without OSA can have adverse neurocognitive and dentofacial consequences. Around 10% of children snore, only 3% of children have OSA. So only 1/3 of children who snore have OSA - What’s going on with the other 2/3? We will try and explore snoring and sleep difficulties in children from a new perspective and establish a background knowledge base from which we can start to tackle real world clinical conundrums in paediatric sleep.