OBJECTIVES Maternal cigarette smoking is established as a major dose-dependent risk factor for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Both prenatal and postnatal exposures to constituents of tobacco smoke are associated with SIDS, but no mechanism of death attributable to nicotine has been found. Breastfeeding gives a substantial increase in absorbed nicotine compared with only environmental toba...

Acromegaly is the result of oversecretion of growth hormone and IGF-1 and the disease can affect several organ systems. Sleep Disordered Breathing (SDB) is a frequent disease in acromegaly patients. The mechanism of SDB is somewhat different in acromegaly patients than SDB in normal population. Although central apneas can be seen, obstructive apneas according to structural changes complicate th...

Fourteen healthy elderly men had polysomnography performed on two consecutive nights to assess the consistency of sleep and breathing from night to night. The reported first-night effect was seen on electroencephalographic sleep, leading to lighter or fitful sleep on the first night. Mean values for apneas, hypopneas, and oxygen desaturations did not change from night 1 to night 2. Five of 14 s...

Abstract Introduction Joubert syndrome (JS) is a rare autosomal recessive disease characterized by malformations of the cerebellar vermis, hypotonia, developmental delay, and respiratory variability. Among potential health challenges that children with congenital central nervous system including JS, may face, sleep concerns are frequent include sleep-related breathing disorders (SRBDs). Report ...

Sympathetic overactivity is implicated in the increased cardiovascular risk of cigarette smokers. Excitatory nicotinic receptors are present on peripheral chemoreceptor cells. Chemoreceptors located in the carotid and aortic bodies increase ventilation (Ve), blood pressure (BP), heart rate (HR), and sympathetic nerve activity to muscle circulation (MSNA) in response to hypoxia. We tested the hy...

STUDY OBJECTIVES Numerous indexes derived from polysomnography are available to characterize sleep-disordered breathing, with no consensus over which measures best predict clinical outcomes. This study addresses the relative merits of using alternative polysomnography indexes by characterizing the consistency and strength of the association of each index with blood pressure and hypertension. ...