Presentations about recent sleep studies, the latest clinical insights and standards of care, and the interplay of lung diseases and sleep will be presented during the conference.
The ATS’s third pillar, sleep, will be well represented at the 2011 International Conference. Data from important studies on sleep will be presented, including the NIH’s Sleep Heart Heath Study; the British Heart Foundation’s Multicentre Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Interventional Cardiovascular, or MOSAIC; and the CPAP Apnea Treatment North American Program, or CATNAP, supported by the NIH and Respironics.
Results from these studies and other findings that will be presented during the conference point to an important direction the field of sleep medicine is taking, according to Amy Jordan, PhD, chair of the Assembly on Sleep and Respiratory Neurobiology Program Committee.
“There is a lot of individual variability of the causes and consequences of sleep-disordered breathing,” said Dr. Jordan, of the University of Melbourne, Australia. “This is an area that is recognized as being very important, but we’re just beginning to research it.”
Among the sessions that will look at the phenotypes for sleep problems are A88 “It Serves a Purpose: Clinical Impact of Pathophysiology on Treatment of OSAS” from 2 to 4:30 p.m. on Sunday, May 15; D9 “Susceptibility to Cardiovascular Consequences of OSA” from 8:15 to 10:45 a.m. on Wednesday, May 18; and B8 “Endothelial Dysfunction, Vascular Disease and Sleep-Disordered Breathing” from 8:15 to 10:45 a.m. on Monday, May 16.
A workshop, entitled WS7 “Positive Pressure Management of Sleep-Disordered Breathing in Special Populations,” from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Wednesday, May 18, will look at two patient groups—those with opioid-induced central sleep-disordered breathing and those with post-stroke-disordered breathing—whose management is particularly challenging.
With the first group, the problem often begins with diagnosis. “A lot of people take pain killers—for headaches, for instance,” explained Atul Malhotra, MD, chair of the Assembly on Sleep and Respiratory Neurobiology. “But they may be reluctant to disclose that information, so the cause of their problem can be easily missed.”
A Clinical Focus
While all the sleep sessions at ATS 2011 will provide a significant amount of clinical information, several will focus almost exclusively on providing the latest clinical insights and standards of care.
One of these is an all-day postgraduate course on polysomnography (PG15), which will take place from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, May 13. The course will cover a broad list of topics, including the 2007 American Academy of Sleep Medicine guidelines for polysomnography scoring, on circadian rhythm disorders, pediatric polysomnography, narcolepsy and leg movements.
Another sleep session that will focus on clinical insights will look at the national epidemic of obesity and its clinical implications in pulmonary, critical care and sleep patients. Session B89, “Obesity: Implications for the Clinical Practice of the Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Physician,” will take place from 2 to 4:30 p.m. on Monday, May 16.
Still another session on promoting adherence to therapies for asthma, COPD and OSA (D12) will explore the reasons for non-adherence, technologies to promote adherence and the effect of health disparities on adherence. This scientific symposium will take place from 8:15 to 10:45 a.m. on Wednesday, May 18.
Sleep & Chronic Inflammatory Diseases
C86 “Sleep in Chronic Lung Disease: Challenges of Sleeping and Breathing,” which will take place from 2 to 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, May 17, will look at the interplay of other lung diseases and sleep.
“If you are interested in clinical problems in pulmonary medicine,” said Dr. Malhotra, of Harvard Medical School, “you have to pay attention to sleep, because that’s eight hours of your patient’s day.”
The presenters during this session will look at sleep as a therapeutic target for asthma, COPD, cystic fibrosis, interstitial lung disease and pulmonary hypertension.
Sessions A88 and D9 are supported by an educational grant from Cephalon, Inc. These grants have no influence on the content, quality and scientific integrity of this CME activity, which is developed by the ATS. All CME sessions are free of commercial interests.