Obstructive sleep (OSA) apnea is a hazardous medical problem that cause physical as well as behavioral perturbation. It's crucial to do a thorough work up and assessment of all cases looking after care for snoring or OSA. Polysomnography (PSG) has been considered the gold standard for assessing and evaluating the degree of OSA in all cases.
The obstruction that happens in OSA is explained by collapse of the pharyngeal airway during sleep. The cause and mechanism of collapse is because of interaction of the easily collapsing upper airway with the relaxing pharyngeal dilator muscles that occurs during sleep. Obesity is one of the essential risk factors.
Upper airway collapse in cases suffering OSA syndrome usually has a multi-levels etiology that might include the retro-palatal, retro-lingual and/or laryngeal areas; the collapse of uvulo-palatal complex as well as the lateral pharyngeal wall might be determined byDISE before surgery.
Various surgical approaches are employed to widen areas of obstruction including nasal operations, palatal and pharyngeal operations , tongue base and epiglottis operations. One of the novel approaches is the usage of barbed suturesand bizactequipment in palatal & pharyngeal widening.