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CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 · Sleep Sci 2022; 15(S 01): 105-109
DOI: 10.5935/1984-0063.20220009
ORIGINAL ARTICLES

Self-reported risk of obstructive sleep apnea syndrome, and awareness about it in the community of 4 insular complexes comprising 41 Greek Islands

Anastasia Adamou   ‡
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Athanasios-Stefanos Giannopoulos   ‡
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Christina Arvaniti
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Ioannis Belios
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Dimitra Dalampira
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Georgios Eleftheriadis
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Thomai Zinoviou
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Petros Kassas
2   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Respiratory Medicine - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
George D. Vavougios
2   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Respiratory Medicine - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Chrissi Hatzoglou
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
2   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Respiratory Medicine - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Konstantinos I. Gourgoulianis
2   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Respiratory Medicine - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
,
Sotirios G. Zarogiannis
1   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Physiology - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
2   Faculty of Medicine, University of Thessaly, Department of Respiratory Medicine - Larissa - Thessaly - Greece.
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Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome (OSAS) is a chronic disease that significantly increases morbidity and mortality of the affected population. There is lack of data concerning the OSAS prevalence in the insular part of Greece. The purpose of this study was to investigate the self-reported prevalence of OSAS in 4 Greek insular complexes comprising 41 islands, and to assess the awareness of the population regarding OSAS and its diagnosis. Our study comprised 700 participants from 41 islands of the Ionian, Cyclades, Dodecanese and Northeast Aegean island complexes that were studied by means of questionnaires via a telephone randomized survey (responsiveness rate of 25.74%). Participants were assessed by the Berlin Questionnaire (BQ) for evaluation of OSA risk, by the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) for evaluation of excessive daytime sleepiness, and by 3 questions regarding the knowledge and diagnosis of OSAS. The percentage of participants at high risk according to BQ was 27.29% and the percentage of people who were at high risk according to ESS was 15.43%. A percentage of 6.29% of the population was at high risk for OSAS (high risk both in BQ and ESS). A high percentage of 73.43%, were aware of OSAS as a syndrome however a significantly less percentage (28.00%) was aware of how a diagnosis of OSAS is established. The community prevalence of OSAS in Greek islands in combination with the low-level awareness of the OSAS diagnostic methods highlights the need for development of health promotion programs aiming at increasing the detection of patients at risk while increasing the awareness of OSAS.

Cross-Sectional Studies - Sleep Apnea - Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome - Risk Assessment

Funding

No funding was received for this research.


Informed consent

Verbal informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the anonymous study.


‡ These authors contributed equally to this work.




Publication History

Received: 20 January 2021

Accepted: 27 July 2021

Article published online:
01 December 2023

© 2023. Brazilian Sleep Association. This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonDerivative-NonCommercial License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit. Contents may not be used for commercial purposes, or adapted, remixed, transformed or built upon. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

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