Obstructive sleep apnea and cortical thickness in females and males.

INTRODUCTION:Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) affects approximately 10% of adults, and alters brain gray and white matter. Psychological and physiological symptoms of the disorder are sex-specific, perhaps related to greater injury occurs in female than male patients in white matter. Our objective was to identify influences of OSA separated by sex on cortical gray matter. METHODS:We assessed cortical thickness in 48 mild-severe OSA patients (mean age±std[range] = 46.5±9.0[30.8-62.7] years; apnea-hypopnea index = 32.6±21.1[6-102] events/hour; 12 female, 36 male; OSA severity: 5 mild, 18 moderate, 25 severe) and 62 controls (mean age = 47.7±8.9[30.9-65.8] years; 22 female, 40 male). All OSA patients were recently-diagnosed via polysomnography, and control subjects screened and a subset assessed with sleep studies. We used high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging to identify OSA-related cortical thinning, based on a model with condition and sex as independent variables. OSA and OSA-by-sex interaction effects were assessed (P