High risk of developing subsequent epilepsy in patients with sleep-disordered breathing

Tomor Harnod; Yu-Chiao Wang; Cheng-Li Lin; Chun-Hung Tseng

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0173491

High risk of developing subsequent epilepsy in patients with sleep-disordered breathing

PLoS One. 2017 Mar 14;12(3):e0173491. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0173491. eCollection 2017.

Authors

Tomor Harnod^{1

2}, Yu-Chiao Wang^{3

4}, Cheng-Li Lin^{3

4}, Chun-Hung Tseng^{5

6}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Neurosurgery, Hualien Tzu Chi General Hospital, Buddhist Tzu Chi Medical Foundation, Hualien, Taiwan.
² College of Medicine, Tzu Chi University, Hualien, Taiwan.
³ Management Office for Health Data, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan.
⁴ College of Medicine, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
⁵ Graduate Institute of Clinical Medical Science and School of Medicine, College of Medicine, China Medical University, Taichung, Taiwan.
⁶ Department of Neurology, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan.

Abstract

Purpose: Sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) is often associated with other medical disorders. Whether SDB interacts with other factors for developing subsequent epilepsy remains unclear.

Methods: This population-based cohort study was conducted using the National Health Insurance Research Database of Taiwan. Patients aged >20 years and diagnosed with SDB between 2000 and 2010 comprised the SDB cohort (n = 138,507), and their data were compared with those of the comparison cohort (n = 138,507). The adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) for epilepsy was calculated using a multivariate Cox proportional hazards model.

Results: The SDB cohort had an increased risk of epilepsy (aHR = 1.50, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.36-1.66). The sex-stratified analysis revealed a significant adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) for epilepsy with a 1.51-fold higher risk for female patients, and also a significantly 1.49-fold higher risk for male patients in the SDB cohort. Although epilepsy incidence increased with age in both cohorts, different age groups in the SDB cohort all had a significantly higher risk of developing epilepsy than comparison cohort.

Conclusion: This population-based cohort study indicates that patients with SDB are at a high risk of developing subsequent epilepsy, in both sexes and all age groups.

MeSH terms

Adult
Aged
Cohort Studies
Epilepsy / complications*
Female
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Risk Factors
Sleep Apnea Syndromes / complications*
Taiwan
Young Adult

Grants and funding

This study was supported in part by the Taiwan Ministry of Health and Welfare Clinical Trial and Research Center of Excellence (MOHW105-TDU-B-212-133019); China Medical University Hospital; Academia Sinica Taiwan Biobank Stroke Biosignature Project (BM10501010037); NRPB Stroke Clinical Trial Consortium (MOST105-2325-B-039-003); Tseng-Lien Lin Foundation, Taichung, Taiwan; Taiwan Brain Disease Foundation, Taipei, Taiwan; Katsuzo and Kiyo Aoshima Memorial Funds, Japan. The funders had no role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. No additional external funding has been received for this study.