Quality of Life in Moderate-Severe OSA Patients from North-Eastern Romania

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is the most common type of sleep disordered breathing, with a significant impact on health-related quality of life (HR-QoL). Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) is the gold-standard treatment for moderate-severe OSA, but is associated with poor patient compliance (due to financial issues and frequent side effects). The purpose of this study is to evaluate HR-QoL among patients with moderate-severe OSA from North-Eastern Romania, at baseline and after 2 months of CPAP. 75 patients were initially included in our study but only 59 subjects returned for a second evaluation. HR-QoL was assessed using the European Quality of Life 5 Domain questionnaire (EQ-5D-5L). OSA has a significant impact on quality of life in our group, with an average EQ-5D-5L index of 0.70±0.27 and an EQ-5D-5L Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) of 63.71±17.74%. Short-term CPAP use was associated with a statistically significant improvement in Epworth Sleepiness Scale (Δ = 4.44, p 4000 lei/month) decided to continue using the device, while the decision not to continue CPAP was significantly more frequent among patients with a low income (< 1000 lei /month - 52.63% versus 21.21%, p=0.01). Our results suggest that income level significantly influences CPAP compliance.