Continuous positive airway pressure as treatment for catathrenia (nocturnal groaning)

Effect of CPAP therapy on catathrenia and OSA: a case report and review of the literature

“…nCPAP may be an option for the treatment of this disturbing condition. nCPAP has been reported to be ineffective in two patients with concurrent mild OSA (Pevernagie et al 2001) but beneficial in one patient with concurrent moderate OSA (Iriarte et al 2006) [11,14].…”

“…b Nocturnal PSG with CPAP titration catathrenia and concurrent moderate OSA. They applied nCPAP therapy, which effectively controlled groaning and snoring [14]. As of 2007, 36 patients (eight of them in abstract form) have been described in the medical literature with the term of catathrenia and eight of these patients were suffering mild or moderate OSA.…”

“…Other authors (Vetrugno et al 2001, oral presentation;Pevernagie et al 2001;Brunner and Gonzalez, 2004) demonstrated the occurrence of groaning also during non-REM sleep, and excluded the association with identifiable neuroradiologic lesions [10][11][12]. Iriarte et al mentioned an asynchronous activation of the diaphragm and the oropharyngeal muscles during REM sleep [14]. Ortega-Albas et al suggest that post-inspiratory neurons, located between the dorsal and ventral respiratory groups, are active during the early expiratory phase and play a key role in breathing generation during sleep, are responsible for groaning [15].…”

Nocturnal Vocalization

“…The response of catathrenia to treatment with either medications or continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) is variable, with some studies showing improvement or even elimination, while others show no improvement. [8][9][10] Our patient did well on CPAP to treat her OSA. Hiccups resolved with treatment of her GERD, and catathrenia was not a symptom that bothered her enough to be treated.…”

Movement Disorders in Sleep

“…The following year, Koo et al [65] performed acoustic analysis of catathrenia and found that it had morphologic regularity, with two types of sound pitches (either a monotonous sinusoidal pattern or a sawtooth-shaped signal with higher fundamental frequency), as opposed to snoring which was distinct from catathrenia and had an irregular signal. Several authors have reported the efficacy of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) in treating this benign but socially awkward condition [66,67].…”