Personality profiles in patients with obstructive sleep apnea.

OBJECTIVE: The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) responses between snorers and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) may be different. Thus, we compared the MMPI responses between snorers and OSA.

DESIGN: A clinical-based cross-sectional survey.

PARTICIPANTS: This is a survey of 94 treatment-naive sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) subjects.

METHOD: Clinical information, body mass index (BMI), 36-item Short Form Health Survey, the Turkish version of the MMPI, Epworth sleepiness scale (ESS), fatigue scale, attention-deficit scale, and polysomnography were collected. All patients with OSA and snorers was accepted as individuals with SDB (AHI > 0 events/h). The threshold of five apnea and hypopnea per hour of sleep was chosen to define both OSA and snorers. Disability profile is consisting of four or more MMPI clinical scale elevations.

RESULTS: OSA patients compared to snorers have significantly higher absolute scores on hypochondriasis (Hs) (65.0 ± 12.0 vs 58.4 ± 7.9, p = 0.01, respectively). OSA patients compared to snorers have significantly higher rate of clinical elevation on both psychopathic deviance (13.0 vs 0 %, p = 0.03, respectively) and Hs (26.1 vs 3.3 %, p = 0.01, respectively). People with disability profile has lower the quality of life, a higher score for inattention, a higher fatigue scores, and higher sleepiness scores. The quality of life and attention deficit and daytime sleepiness scores were associated with total MMPI absolute score in individuals with SDB in bivariate analyses.

CONCLUSION: Present study indicated that patients with OSAS compared to snorers displayed significantly more hyopchondriasis and psychopathic deviance personality characteristics. The daytime functions in individuals with sleep-disordered breathing may be influenced by the severity of psychopathology.