Experts discuss possible link between sleep disorder and dementia

More than 12 million Americans suffer from sleep apena, a common disorder that causes abnormal pauses in breathing during sleep. And this week, UCSF research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed that older women with the disorder were twice as likely as their healthy counterparts to develop dementia within 5 years.

In a segment this morning on KQED’s Forum, Clete Kushida, MD, PhD, medical director of the Stanford Sleep Medicine Center, discussed the new findings and responded to listeners’ calls. He was joined by Katie Stone, PhD, co-author of the study, and Edward Grandi of the American Sleep Apnea Association.

Previously: In mice, at least, uninterrupted sleep is critical for memory and Sleep apnea linked to increased risk of stroke