Abstract Body (Do not enter title and authors here): Background: Cancer and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) individually elevate cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and stroke risk. However, it is unclear whether OSA contributes additional CVD risk in persons with pre-existing cancer.
Methods: Using the TriNetX, an electronic healthcare records-based database from large healthcare organizations, we compared adverse CVD outcomes and ischemic stroke incidence between patients with and without OSA diagnosed with cancer between 01/2012 and 06/2023. Adverse CVD outcomes was defined as a composite of incident heart failure, incident atrial fibrillation / flutter, incident myocardial infarction or all-cause mortality. Patients were eligible to enter the cohort on the day of cancer diagnosis. The follow-up period for outcome events began one year after patients entered the cohort and patients contributed follow-up time till the outcome event occurred or till the end of the study period.
After propensity risk score matching on demographics and comorbidities we conducted a time-to-event analyses.
Results: A total of 509,477 patients with both cancer and OSA were propensity score matched to 509,477 patients with cancer but without OSA. The table shows the demographic and comorbidities of the matched groups. Among persons with cancer, OSA diagnosis was associated with increased risk of adverse CVD outcomes (HR: 1.37, 95% CI: 1.36 – 1.38). OSA in persons with cancer increased the risk of heart failure, atrial fibrillation / flutter and myocardial infarction. OSA also increased the risk of ischemic stroke. However, total mortality risk was reduced among those with OSA. See the table for details.
Conclusion: OSA increases the risk of adverse CVD outcomes and ischemic stroke in persons with cancer. These analyses suggest that persons with cancer should be screened and treated for OSA. Future studies will need to determine the impact of OSA treatment e.g., positive airway pressure (PAP) therapy on CVD related outcomes in persons with cancer. Further investigation into the paradoxical reduction in all-cause mortality with OSA is warranted.