Complications and safe prescription of interventions for adult sleep disordered breathing in Australia

Abstract

How safe is continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP)?Guidelines and Consensus Statements outline the role of specific therapies for obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) (1-3).The landmark paper by Sullivan et al. (4) in 1981 permitted a straightforward approach to treating OSA with CPAP. Debate did follow, some agreeing (5) and others criticising social, technical and physiologic problems encountered with initial and long-term use of CPAP (6).A degree of scepticism developed about the complexity of dealing with pumps, masks and pressures in real life