Reply #80: Interesting response Heresy

[Fluothane]

Usually I am content in just reading the threads on this website, but this comment triggered me to respond. OSA is a real disease in this culture and other cultures around the world. No, not everybody snores, and snoring is not a normal pattern of ventilation.

Snoring indicates that you are having airway obstruction. When you snore your minute ventilation decreases and as a result your arterial content of carbon dioxide increases. High levels of carbon dioxide cause vasoconstriction in the pulmonary vasculature. This vasoconstriction causes the right side of your heart to pump harder and eventually leads to remodeling of the right ventricle. Give it some time and you end up with pulmonary hypertension (bad). Give it some more time and you get cor pulmonale (death sentence). So…yes OSA does kill people, and yes they can be quite challenging patients when anesthetized.