The role of allergic rhinitis in obstructive sleep apnea syndrome

Obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) is a disease characterized by disordered breathing while sleeping and it affects a large part of the population. Many factors have been implicated in the etiology. It could be central, pheripheral or mixt. In clinical practise, we face with more pheripheral apnea as otolaryngology specialist. Allergic rhinitis disease is characterized by edema and congestion of the nasal, nasopharyngeal and pharyngeal mucosa. The allergic rhinitis symptoms in patients with OSAS aggravates the symptoms of OSAS. Exploration of allergic rhinitis disease with a simple test before diagnosis of OSAS and the treatment of these patients could fasciliate the diagnosis and treatment of OSAS. In this study with 54 patients, we tried to indicate that allergic rhinitis is more common in patients with OSAS than normal patients and allergic rhinitis symptoms may exacerbate or create false OSAS symptoms with using SFAR ( score for allergic rhinitis) scoring used as a screening test for allergic rhinitis. We emphasized that with a simple screening test, patients with allergic rhinitis could be excluded before diagnosing OSAS and more accurate diagnoss and treatment could be applied to this patients.