Chestnet.org - In women, habitual snoring may be an independent cause of excessive daytime sleepiness and daytime fatigue, regardless of sleep apnea occurrences, according to a study in the November 2008 issue of the journal CHEST.

Researchers from Sweden performed polysomnography on 400 randomly selected women, aged 20 to 70 years. The apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) was calculated, and women who acknowledged snoring loudly and either disturbingly often or very often were considered habitual snorers. Habitual snoring was independently related to excessive daytime sleepiness, falling asleep involuntarily during the day, waking up unrefreshed, daytime fatigue, and dry mouth on awakening. The correlation of snoring to daytime fatigue and sleepiness was present even after adjusting for AHI, age, BMI, smoking, total sleep time, percentage of slow-wave sleep, and percentage of rapid eye movement sleep.

Researchers conclude that snoring is an independent cause of excessive daytime sleepiness in women and not merely a proxy for sleep apnea.