IFAS Study Shows Sleep Apnea is Virtually Undocumented among U.S. Nursing Home Residents

Posted: May 18, 2008

A new IFAS report, Documentation of Sleep Apnea in Nursing Homes: United States 2004, reveals that in 2004, only 0.5% of U.S. nursing home residents had sleep apnea documented on their medical records. These findings, which were based on a national survey of medical records of a representative sample of 1.49 million nursing home residents, are in stark contrast to numerous, in-person studies of nursing home residents that clearly showed a high prevalence of sleep apnea in this population. Clinical studies demonstrating the high prevalence of sleep apnea in long term care settings were published as far back as 1989. Taken together with these previous studies, the new IFAS report demonstrating that sleep apnea is essentially undocumented in nursing home residents strongly suggests a profound "disconnect" between the occurrence of a common medical condition and the likelihood that this condition is formally documented. This disconnect is of concern given the known associations between sleep apnea and several outcomes that are important for nursing home residents including nighttime urination, hypertension, cognition, cardiovascular disease and agitation among persons with Alzheimer's disease.

The IFAS report hypothesizes that the lack of documentation of apnea in nursing homes may be due in part to lack of education and awareness of apnea and its consequences among physicians and other members of the nursing home care team. Further, nursing home professionals may avoid screening and diagnosing sleep apnea because of concerns about the difficulty of treating this population should a diagnosis be made. Nursing home clinical staff may benefit from increased educational efforts focusing on the presentation and treatment benefits of sleep apnea in nursing home residents.

Read more about sleep apnea in U.S. nursing homes: Download Report

For more information contact Helaine Resnick