Purpose: Sleep apnea (SA) is highly prevalent in post-stroke patients. Due to physical disability and relative inaccessibility of polysomnography (PSG) to test for SA, patients with stroke frequently remain undiagnosed and untreated. Portable SA monitoring can facilitate at-home or in-hospital testing for SA. However, portable SA monitoring is not recommended in those with complex medical conditions, such as stroke, due to the lack of validation of portable monitoring in such patients.
Methods: The objective of our study was to test the accuracy and feasibility of a portable single-channel acoustic device, BresoDx™ for quantifying the apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) and diagnosing SA in a post-stroke population. Patients who recently suffered a stroke and were undergoing rehabilitation in a stroke rehabilitation unit (SRU) underwent testing with BresoDx both simultaneously during attended PSG and unattended on the SRU.
Results: We studied 23 stroke patients of whom 78% had SA (defined by AHI ≥15) on PSG. All of the patients tolerated the BresoDx. Using cutoff AHI of ≥15 by PSG to diagnose SA, BresoDx had sensitivity of 90.0%, specificity of 84.6%, and overall accuracy of 87.0% in the laboratory.
Conclusions: This study demonstrates that BresoDx is well tolerated and feasible to use in the post-stroke population where it was found to have excellent positive and negative predictive values for the diagnosis of SA.
Keywords: Home sleep testing; Polygraphy; Sleep apnea; Stroke.