• Guest - w'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

Research investigates strength of factors in link between type 2 diabetes and sleep apnea

DCUK NewsBot

DCUK NewsBot

Well-Known Member
Messages
4,059
People with type 2 diabetes could be at a greater risk of developing obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), independent of other factors, research suggests. OSA occurs when the walls of the throat relax and narrow during sleep. Symptoms usually include loud snoring, noisy and laboured breathing and repeated short periods where breathing is interrupted by gasping or snorting. OSA has long been associated with an increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes, so researchers sought to investigate this link further. The University of Birmingham study involved looking at health data from between January 2005 and December 2017 of people with OSA and compared those with type 2 diabetes to those who did not. By using the Health Improvement Network (THIN), a primary care database, the research team found 1,296,489 people who had type 2 diabetes and 360,250 who did not. The researchers' findings indicate that the association between type 2 diabetes and OSA is bidirectional. This means that the study suggests that type 2 diabetes may encourage the development of OSA, and OSA may encourage progression of type 2 diabetes. Out of the risk factors for OSA reviewed by the study, obesity was the most significant. Obesity conferred an eight times greater risk of OSA. This compared with a two times greater risk for people that were overweight but not obese. Being male, having been prescribed insulin recently, having depression and having diabetes-related foot disease were among other factors identified with greater risk of OSA. The researchers state that understanding the complex relationships between OSA and type 2 diabetes is key as OSA may be a risk factor that can be modified to reduce the impact on type 2 diabetes. By extension, type 2 diabetes appears to be a risk factor in OSA. The findings have been published in the Diabetes Care journal.

Continue reading...
 
It’s my understanding that sleep apnea is another symptom of metabolic dysfunction so it makes sense that there would be correlation with T2DM. In my opinion we need more understanding that clinical diabetes is a symptom of metabolic disorder, not a disease that causes all the other coexisting symptoms.
 
From my personal experience, feeling tired when T2 created a need to do the testing when nothing else could be seen as a cause. Maybe the results of this research are predetermined by the population of people being tested not by a true correlation between the general population and OSA. In my case I was diagnosed by a private company that made its money from selling equipment to stop apnea and from a second set of test that were not covered by the public insurance plan. In fact the design of the testing equipment seemed to have been geared to a positive result especially for people who sleep on their sides. Several months later my tiredness disappeared. It only comes back for a couple of weeks after the beginning of daylight savings time!
 
Jim Lahey said:
It’s my understanding that sleep apnea is another symptom of metabolic dysfunction so it makes sense that there would be correlation with T2DM. In my opinion we need more understanding that clinical diabetes is a symptom of metabolic disorder, not a disease that causes all the other coexisting symptoms.
Click to expand...
As someone with T2 and sleep apnoea, I can agree with that. However, my sleep apnoea started when I was overweight and drank too much alcohol. With sleep apnoea, however, there doesn't seem to be a way to "cure" it - I was recently told that I am still stopping breathing during sleep too many times to stop using the CPAP. Also, non-use of the CPAP when you have started will get you disqualified from driving.
 
I am not surprised. I am T2, was overweight and had OSA but I can't tell whether the OSA was present before diagnoses of T2 or occurred as a result. OSA was certainly diagnosed after T2 but that cannot be taken as definitive evidence that T2 caused the OSA. Certainly since loosing weight my T2 has improved and I have been discharged by the sleep clinic as I no longer have OSA and no longer need a CPAP. So my conclusion is that weight is the major contributory factor in both OSA and T2.
 
Back
Top