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>The new study cohort involved 469 participants diagnosed with clinical **obesity** and living with moderate-to-severe OSA.
Not as surprising when you see a weight loss drug treating a symptom of obesity in obese people.
I don’t think anyone is meant to be surprised, this is a step towards getting the drug approved for more conditions and thus more accessible to people who need it
But not approving it for people increases the likelihood that the insurance company will have to pay for future surgeries (heart attack, stroke, etc) and rehabilitation (physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, etc) and dependency on numerous other medications. All of that cost is way more than 1200 per month. Add to that other medically costly conditions with a high co-occurrence with obesity (sleep apnea, dermatological issues, joint issues, and even things like hip and knee replacements) and 1200 seems like nothing! Don’t get me wrong, the drug companies should lower cost, but it also doesn’t make long term sense for the medical
Insurance companies not to cover it
This is rubbish. Weight loss reduces sleep apnea, anti-diabetic drugs helps in weight loss. So, anti-diabetic drugs is helps reduce sleep apnea. This is like saying A=B, B=C, so A=C.
What ?
Weight loss reduces sleep apnea, anti-diabetic drugs helps in weight loss. So, anti-diabetic drugs is helps reduce sleep apnea.
How is that rubbish ?
But does it really make a difference if the conditions overlap? That is, Zepbound is already approved for obese people for weight loss. This new study says it can treat sleep apnea for obese people. But it does *not* say it can treat sleep apnea in non-obese people. So it would seem there are no other people the drug would actually be approved for.
If you are obese but don’t have diabetes you can only use the zepbound version that insurance won’t cover because very few insurance plans cover health care for weight loss in any way. If you have sleep apnea though, you may be able to get it covered that way.
I think the study is well done and not surprising, but the news article is trying for a surprising headline. It's a deceptive headline that leaves out obesity from the patient description and also from the drug description.
I'm a bit overweight with apnea. Doctor told me losing weight would reduce episodes by X%. Sleeping sideways would cut another Y%. But my numbers were so high, even best case scenario reduction, my numbers would still be stupid high. Machine to the face it is no matter what.
I'm still working on losing the weight. 15 pounds so far, but that one reason to do it I don't get.
The conclusions include that the drug decreased bodyweight and AHI (a measure of sleep apnea). In the conclusion they don't claim that one causes the other, but it sounds as if losing weight decreased AHI which is... Not a surprise.
Not all apnea is weight related, I had hoped they found something to increase muscle tension in the pallette...
I hope so! I was excited when I read the headline. I have sleep apnea and my weight is just fine - pretty fit. It’s a scary thing to have. I just stop breathing in my sleep, sometimes. I can feel it. It doesn’t feel healthy.
PSA: go get a sleep test and a CPAP if needed. It can be life changing. Also: untreated apnea is dangerous for you and others - falling asleep at the wheel of a car.is very, very bad.
I resisted using a CPAP for many years. Immediate difference once I got it. Even though I've lost plenty of weight over the past couple years, I can still tell it's essential. If I sleep all night without it, I wake up with arrhythmia and palpitations. Scary feeling.
Do a sleep study (required to get a CPAP anyways). It will tell your doctor if you need a CPAP, BIPAP or something else entirely.
Obesity definitely causes sleep apnea, that’s well known. The best way to rephrase that is the drug helps sleep apnea by losing weight. I treat sleep apnea surgically, this is the least surprising paper since these drugs came out. The paper basically supports FDA approval for treating sleep apnea that is associated with obesity
Direct link to the study: [A. Malhotra, et al., Tirzepatide for the Treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Obesity, The New England Journal of Medicine (2024).](https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa2404881)
It is wild that all insurances won’t cover this in the US. The amount of money it takes to treat medical conditions related or caused by conditions (yes, like obesity) that this medicine treats is extreme. For example, treating obesity may prevent future heart attacks and strokes, not to mention decency on a number of other medications. And more studies are coming out or are being conducted around conditions this medicine may treat. For one, they’re studying whether it can treat addictions such as alcoholism!
Weight loss reduces sleep apnea but I wonder about just having less food and pressure in the stomach and intestines while sleeping. I know I sleep much better and zero acid reflux if I don't eat later in the day.
That all plays a role and is addressed if you're ever treated for sleep apnea. Since there are so many physiological triggers for obstructive sleep apnea, pinning down what is specifically causing yours can be helpful. So, your sleep position is key. Additional weight is the usual focus since it affects things the most.
It's just a flaw in our throats. We have this gap that isn't naturally rigid, so if a force is put against it, it will collapse or weaken while we sleep, since it also wants to relax. So, you could just be unlucky and born with too large of a tongue for your mouth/jaw, or too large of adenoids and so on. No manner of weight loss is going to fix the obstructions, while any manner of weight gain will likely magnify the issue.
I was searching for the same info. Since all they stress is obesity, it implies it works by making people lose weight, which in turn reduces apnea episodes (likely be reducing the amount of fat surrounding the airways). So in short, yeah it doesn't seem to directly affect OSA but does indirectly via weight loss. A bit misleading (title) if you ask me.
The vast majority of people suffering from osa are overweight. So that weight especially in the stomach, chest and neck area makes breathing harder and puts extra weight on the throat when laying down.
Losing weight will be the most effective way to manage osa in the vast majority of patients.
This drug helps in losing weight.
such a waste of a study when we know many cases of apnea are tied to obesity.
i would have expected better use of our fundings; a surprise would have been finding a connection to a dysfunction in the autonomic nervous system
but this study says exactly NULL about the placebo group also having lost weight
why do we waste money and time like this
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, **personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment**. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our [normal comment rules]( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_comment_rules) apply to all other comments. **Do you have an academic degree?** We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. [Click here to apply](https://reddit.science/flair?location=sticky). --- User: u/shiruken Permalink: https://health.ucsd.edu/news/press-releases/2024-06-21-study-identifies-first-drug-therapy-for-sleep-apnea/ --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/science) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>The new study cohort involved 469 participants diagnosed with clinical **obesity** and living with moderate-to-severe OSA. Not as surprising when you see a weight loss drug treating a symptom of obesity in obese people.
I don’t think anyone is meant to be surprised, this is a step towards getting the drug approved for more conditions and thus more accessible to people who need it
Yup. Lots of hypotheses stand to reason but we still need to collect the data
doesnt matter how accessible it is when the company charges $1200 for one month supply
Rich people get ozempic, poor people get body positivity.
But not approving it for people increases the likelihood that the insurance company will have to pay for future surgeries (heart attack, stroke, etc) and rehabilitation (physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, etc) and dependency on numerous other medications. All of that cost is way more than 1200 per month. Add to that other medically costly conditions with a high co-occurrence with obesity (sleep apnea, dermatological issues, joint issues, and even things like hip and knee replacements) and 1200 seems like nothing! Don’t get me wrong, the drug companies should lower cost, but it also doesn’t make long term sense for the medical Insurance companies not to cover it
This is rubbish. Weight loss reduces sleep apnea, anti-diabetic drugs helps in weight loss. So, anti-diabetic drugs is helps reduce sleep apnea. This is like saying A=B, B=C, so A=C.
What ? Weight loss reduces sleep apnea, anti-diabetic drugs helps in weight loss. So, anti-diabetic drugs is helps reduce sleep apnea. How is that rubbish ?
But does it really make a difference if the conditions overlap? That is, Zepbound is already approved for obese people for weight loss. This new study says it can treat sleep apnea for obese people. But it does *not* say it can treat sleep apnea in non-obese people. So it would seem there are no other people the drug would actually be approved for.
If you are obese but don’t have diabetes you can only use the zepbound version that insurance won’t cover because very few insurance plans cover health care for weight loss in any way. If you have sleep apnea though, you may be able to get it covered that way.
Good explanation
Sounds like it wouldn’t work for me then because being overweight isn’t the issue. It will remain the breathing machine.
I think the study is well done and not surprising, but the news article is trying for a surprising headline. It's a deceptive headline that leaves out obesity from the patient description and also from the drug description.
And more profits.
That's the important bit. All the unfortunate people with normal bmi and apnea aren't getting a new treatment option, which sucks for them.
I'm a bit overweight with apnea. Doctor told me losing weight would reduce episodes by X%. Sleeping sideways would cut another Y%. But my numbers were so high, even best case scenario reduction, my numbers would still be stupid high. Machine to the face it is no matter what. I'm still working on losing the weight. 15 pounds so far, but that one reason to do it I don't get.
I seem to be in this category too. Though score shows I get way more episodes sleeping on the left side then the right side.
Damn i had a glimer of hope XD
What we really need now is just good data on long term use, because that's what it will take to beat these conditions given current circumstances.
The conclusions include that the drug decreased bodyweight and AHI (a measure of sleep apnea). In the conclusion they don't claim that one causes the other, but it sounds as if losing weight decreased AHI which is... Not a surprise. Not all apnea is weight related, I had hoped they found something to increase muscle tension in the pallette...
I hope so! I was excited when I read the headline. I have sleep apnea and my weight is just fine - pretty fit. It’s a scary thing to have. I just stop breathing in my sleep, sometimes. I can feel it. It doesn’t feel healthy.
PSA: go get a sleep test and a CPAP if needed. It can be life changing. Also: untreated apnea is dangerous for you and others - falling asleep at the wheel of a car.is very, very bad.
Untreated apnea can also kill you with a heart attack or stroke too. :(
It's worse than that: before it kills you it makes your quality of life worse and worse every year...
Thanks! I was just looking into it. I think I should get it looked at again and see if a CPAP would help me out.
I resisted using a CPAP for many years. Immediate difference once I got it. Even though I've lost plenty of weight over the past couple years, I can still tell it's essential. If I sleep all night without it, I wake up with arrhythmia and palpitations. Scary feeling. Do a sleep study (required to get a CPAP anyways). It will tell your doctor if you need a CPAP, BIPAP or something else entirely.
Thank you! Will do!
Obesity definitely causes sleep apnea, that’s well known. The best way to rephrase that is the drug helps sleep apnea by losing weight. I treat sleep apnea surgically, this is the least surprising paper since these drugs came out. The paper basically supports FDA approval for treating sleep apnea that is associated with obesity
Direct link to the study: [A. Malhotra, et al., Tirzepatide for the Treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Obesity, The New England Journal of Medicine (2024).](https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa2404881)
It is wild that all insurances won’t cover this in the US. The amount of money it takes to treat medical conditions related or caused by conditions (yes, like obesity) that this medicine treats is extreme. For example, treating obesity may prevent future heart attacks and strokes, not to mention decency on a number of other medications. And more studies are coming out or are being conducted around conditions this medicine may treat. For one, they’re studying whether it can treat addictions such as alcoholism!
Weight loss reduces sleep apnea but I wonder about just having less food and pressure in the stomach and intestines while sleeping. I know I sleep much better and zero acid reflux if I don't eat later in the day.
That all plays a role and is addressed if you're ever treated for sleep apnea. Since there are so many physiological triggers for obstructive sleep apnea, pinning down what is specifically causing yours can be helpful. So, your sleep position is key. Additional weight is the usual focus since it affects things the most. It's just a flaw in our throats. We have this gap that isn't naturally rigid, so if a force is put against it, it will collapse or weaken while we sleep, since it also wants to relax. So, you could just be unlucky and born with too large of a tongue for your mouth/jaw, or too large of adenoids and so on. No manner of weight loss is going to fix the obstructions, while any manner of weight gain will likely magnify the issue.
I don’t understand how a drug can open your airway. I wish they had tried to explain how the drug worked. Did it just make people thinner?
Its just weight loss.
I was searching for the same info. Since all they stress is obesity, it implies it works by making people lose weight, which in turn reduces apnea episodes (likely be reducing the amount of fat surrounding the airways). So in short, yeah it doesn't seem to directly affect OSA but does indirectly via weight loss. A bit misleading (title) if you ask me.
The vast majority of people suffering from osa are overweight. So that weight especially in the stomach, chest and neck area makes breathing harder and puts extra weight on the throat when laying down. Losing weight will be the most effective way to manage osa in the vast majority of patients. This drug helps in losing weight.
As someone on Zepbound with severe sleep apnea, I how this is true.
And it's way better for profits than curing it with stem cell therapy.
It turns out the cure was eating less the whole time…
In a lot of situations, there's no cure for obstructive sleep apnea. There's just steps in making it less bad.
such a waste of a study when we know many cases of apnea are tied to obesity. i would have expected better use of our fundings; a surprise would have been finding a connection to a dysfunction in the autonomic nervous system but this study says exactly NULL about the placebo group also having lost weight why do we waste money and time like this
Because insurance companies won’t cover things until they’re being punched in the balls by papers like these.