Success and failure in treatment of sleep apnea patients.

A variety of surgical procedures exist to treat obstructive sleep apnea in adults. Some, such as tracheotomy and maxillomandibular advancement, have very high cure rates, over 90%. These procedures have significant disadvantages, however, and there is a need to define the best combination of low morbidity procedures to provide similar success. To do this, better means to diagnose the sites of obstruction must be used and new procedures must be developed. This article reviews where we are in reaching these goals.