Two separate studies show sleep apnea, a common disorder that causes difficulty breathing while asleep, is linked to cancer. It’s estimated about 28 million Americans have some form of sleep apnea, which interrupts a person’s restful sleep and typically causes snoring.
The link
“This is really big news,” said Dr. Joseph Golish, a professor of sleep medicine with the MetroHealth System in Cleveland who was not involved in the research. “It’s the first time this has been shown, and it looks like a very solid association,” he said.
According to a NY Times article, “In one of the new studies, researchers in Spain followed thousands of patients at sleep clinics and found that those with the most severe forms of sleep apnea had a 65 percent greater risk of developing cancer of any kind. The second study, of about 1,500 government workers in Wisconsin, showed that those with the most breathing abnormalities at night had five times the rate of dying from cancer as people without the sleep disorder. Both research teams only looked at cancer diagnoses and outcomes in general, without focusing on any specific type of cancer.”
More studies needed
“That is really striking,” said Dr. F. Javier Nieto, one of the study’s authors and chairman of the department of population health sciences at the University of Wisconsin. “It could be something else, but it’s hard to imagine that something we didn’t control for is causing this.”
Both studies were observational studies, which come with limitations. The link between cancer and sleep apnea has been detected in animals, but these studies are the first to suggest the connection also exists in humans.
“I would say that this is one more instance that shows that sleep apnea can have profound impacts for people’s health,” he added. “Not breathing while you’re sleeping is a serious problem.”
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