Images in Sleep Medicine Title: Is positional therapy the adequate therapy for all positional OSA (POSA) patients?

BACKGROUND

Positional Therapy (PT) is a behavioral treatment of choice for many Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) patients who suffer from positional OSA (POSA), i.e.patients who show apneas and hypopneas related mainly to a specific sleep posture, which in most of the cases is the supine position.

CASE PRESENTATION: Here we report the poslysomnographic data of a 36 years old patient with severe POSA with a clear positional effect on the occurrence of apneas and with continuous and loud snoring in the lateral postures.

DISCUSSION: This particular case calls into question if PT is the right solution for this patient. Here we discussed the pro - and - con arguments for using PT in this particular patient and we also offer a few possible treatment alternatives.