Down's syndrome with lingual tonsil hypertrophy producing sleep apnoea.

A 12-year-old girl is presented with Down's syndrome and lingual tonsillitis causing sleep apnoea. In order to overcome her sleep apnoea she adopted a functional sleeping posture. The sleep apnoea was successfully treated by a single staged lingual tonsillectomy without preliminary tracheostomy. A return to a normal sleeping posture occurred spontaneously in the early post-operative period.