{"id":242035,"date":"2026-08-02T06:57:34","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T11:57:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/obstructive-sleep-apnea-in-people-with-epilepsy-modifying-risk"},"modified":"2026-08-02T06:57:34","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T11:57:34","slug":"obstructive-sleep-apnea-in-people-with-epilepsy-modifying-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/obstructive-sleep-apnea-in-people-with-epilepsy-modifying-risk","title":{"rendered":"Obstructive sleep apnea in people with epilepsy: Modifying risk"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/obstructive-sleep-apnea-in-people-with-epilepsy-modifying-risk2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common but underdiagnosed and undertreated sleep disorder among people with epilepsy (PWE). In PWE, this sleep disorder is often managed as a comorbid condition rather than a contributor to epilepsy outcomes. For many years, OSA has been associated with higher seizure burden and interictal epileptiform discharges. Emerging evidence links OSA to late onset epilepsy (LOE) and increased risk markers for sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP). This evidence also suggests that treating OSA with continuous positive airway pressure may improve seizure control. This critical review of the literature posits that OSA should be viewed as a modifiable risk factor for PWE. We apply the Bradford Hill criteria for causation as a framework to appraise the evidence connecting OSA with seizure severity, incident LOE, and SUDEP risk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common but underdiagnosed and undertreated sleep disorder among people with epilepsy (PWE). In PWE, this sleep disorder is often managed as a comorbid condition rather than a contributor to epilepsy outcomes. For many years, OSA has been associated with higher seizure burden and interictal epileptiform discharges. Emerging evidence links [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-242035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242035\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}