Dexamethasone as a Novel Treatment for Obstructive Sleep Apnea in Children
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract Rationale: Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a sleep-related breathing disorder, characterized by upper airway obstruction. The first-line treatment for OSA is an adenotonsillectomy (AT), but there are long surgical wait times, leaving many children untreated and at high risk for long term health effects. OSA is also a chronic inflammatory condition that often presents with upper airway inflammation. However, oral anti-inflammatory treatments such as dexamethasone have not been fully explored.The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of dexamethasone in reducing the severity of moderate to severe OSA in children. Methods: This randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trial compared a 3-day course of dexamethasone (0.5 mg/kg, max. 8 mg/day) to a placebo control in children between the ages of 2-10 years diagnosed with moderate to severe OSA (Obstructive apnea-hypopnea index (OAHI) ≥5). Overnight polysomnograms (PSGs), otolaryngology assessments, and questionnaires addressing OSA symptoms were conducted at baseline, 2 weeks and 6 months after the intervention. Primary outcome was the change in OAHI 2 weeks post-intervention. Results: Ten participants without surgical treatment of OSA were recruited: 5 received dexamethasone (3 male, median age: 4.0 years [IQR 2.5, 7.0]) and 5 received a placebo (1 male, median age: 4.0 years [IQR 2.5, 8.0]). Two weeks post intervention, there was no significant difference in the change in OAHI between the groups. The dexamethasone group had a median increase of 0.1 events/hour [IQR -7.2, 3.3], while the placebo group showed an increase of 2.1 events/hour [IQR 2.4, 8.5] (p=0.056). Within the dexamethasone group, 2 participants experienced a clinically significant 50% decrease in OAHI. No significant differences between the groups were found in changes in tonsil size and OSA symptom scores. At the 6-month follow-up, the initial reduction in OAHI in the dexamethasone group was not sustained, with median OAHI worsening compared to baseline (Baseline: 11.1 [IQR 8.7, 13.3]; 6 months post; 17.6 [IQR 9.3, 17.6]). Conclusions: Dexamethasone did not significantly reduce OAHI compared to placebo, though some participants showed a short-term response suggesting potential efficacy. Further studies in larger populations are needed before implementing in clinical practice.
Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.
How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".