As experience grows, this has been associated with greater success and longer survival rates. Unfortunately, this therapy remains greatly limited due to donor availability. Joseph Kanarek, M.D., Director, Cystic Fibrosis Center. Return to top. Sleep disorder breathing often goes undetected by both parents and physicians.
Children can have severe apnea yet have normal daytime function.
Many, but by no means all, patients with OSA also have some neurologic or musculoskeletal condition. Frequently parents assume their children's sleep pattern is normal for them or is just part of a constellation of symptoms from their underlying syndrome. Common symptoms of OSA include persistent snoring, difficulty breathing during sleep, witnessed apnea, restless sleep, and mouth breathing. Less common symptoms include nausea, vomiting, enuresis, behavioral problems, and morning headaches. Unfortunately, many children with OSA go unrecognized until complications from severe long-standing hypoxia lead to failure to thrive, developmental delay, cor pulmonale, or respiratory failure.