Researchers have long known that SCI patients are significantly more likely than people without SCI to have conditions that cause disordered breathing during sleep. These include central sleep apnea, a serious condition in which patients’ breathing stops periodically during sleep due to faulty signals from the brain. However, it’s been unknown whether the level of injury has any correlation with the risk of sleep-disordered breathing.
The researchers found that 63 percent of patients with cervical SCI had central sleep apnea, compared to only 13 percent of patients with thoracic SCI.