The Effects Of Oral Appliances On Daytime Sleepiness Extent And Life Quality Of OSAHS Patients

Objective: To assess the changes in daytime sleepiness and life quality of OSAHSpatients after wearing oral appliances by using the Epworth sleepiness scale (ESS) and theCalgary sleep apnea quality of life index (SAQLI), and to study the correlation betweendaytime sleepiness, life quality, and the result of the polysomnography (PSG) examination.Methods: Treating35mild and moderate OSAHS patients selected through PSGexamination, inclusion and exclusion criteria with oral appliances, surveying the patients fortheir daytime sleepiness and life quality a week before and the three months following therapywith ESS and SAQLI questionnaires, and conducting mean comparison, paired t-test,two-sample t-test and Pearson correlation analysis on the information obtained.Results: The differences of mild and moderate patients’ apnea hyponea index(AHI),lowest blood oxygen saturation(LSaO2), and ESS and SAQLI questionnaire scores between aweek before and the three months following wearing oral appliances are of statisticalsignificance (P<0.05); the objective response rate of the treatment with oral appliances is88.57%, and quality of life generally improves by77.1%. The differences of both mild andmoderate patients’ various indexes before and after treatment are of statisticalsignificance(P<0.05). Before treatment, OSAHS patients’s ESS and SAQLI questionnaires arecorrelated with AHI and LSaO2, and the ESS scores are correlated with the SAOLIscores(P<0.05).Conclusion: Wearing oral appliances has positive objective and subjective curativeeffects on OSAHS. Its efficacy was related to the degree of disease of the patients. To someextent, the OSAHS patients’ subjective assessment can reflect the degree of their disease, but the objective indicators can not be used to replace the evaluation of patients’ life quality.