A Checklist for Evaluation of Potential Airway and Breathing Disorders

Used by permission from Dental Sleep Practice magazine.

In October 2017, the American Dental Association (ADA) released a policy statement addressing dentistry’s role in sleep-related breathing disorders.1 The policy encourages dental professionals to screen their patients for Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA), Upper Airway Resistance Syndrome (UARS), and other breathing disorders. The ADA advocates working in collaboration with other trained medical colleagues and emphasizes the effectiveness of intra-oral appliance therapy for treating patients with mild to moderate OSA and CPAP-intolerant patients with severe OSA.

With the endorsement of the ADA, screening and treating sleep-related breathing disorders has become the newest focus of integrative dental medicine. The purpose of this article is to provide a simplified Checklist to guide the dental team in reviewing each patient’s:

• History (signs & symptoms)

• Clinical Evaluation

• Screening & Testing

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Educational aims

This article is written in behalf of all clinical team members, to orient each of us in the basic understanding of the signs and symptoms of dysfunctional breathing and sleep commonly found in our dental practice population. The dedicated clinician is encouraged to read each of the references from this practical article.