Carbon dioxide levels during polygraphy in children with sleep-disordered breathing

Purpose The recent scoring rules of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) define hypoventilation in children as a carbon dioxide (CO2) level of >50 mmHg for >25 % of total sleep time (partial pressure of CO2 (PCO2) > 50[>25 %]). As there is no validated level of nocturnal hypoventilation with regard to end-organ damage in children, we evaluated the prevalence of hypoventilation with the AASM definition but also with a lesser degree of elevated CO2 in children with sleep-disordered breathing (SDB).