{"id":11489,"date":"2026-02-18T19:00:33","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T01:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/?p=11489"},"modified":"2026-02-18T19:00:36","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T01:00:36","slug":"covid-survivors-may-be-at-higher-risk-for-obstructive-sleep-apnea-for-up-to-4-5-years-post-infection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/2026\/02\/18\/covid-survivors-may-be-at-higher-risk-for-obstructive-sleep-apnea-for-up-to-4-5-years-post-infection\/","title":{"rendered":"COVID survivors may be at higher risk for obstructive sleep apnea for up to 4.5 years post-infection"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"panel body-content\"><div class=\"panel__container\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cidrap.umn.edu\/covid-19\/covid-survivors-may-be-higher-risk-obstructive-sleep-apnea-45-years-post-infection\">CIDRAP<\/a> Patients with both severe and nonsevere COVID-19 infections are at higher risk for both new-onset obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and related serious complications than their uninfected peers, Albert Einstein College of Medicine researchers report in a&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.medrxiv.org\/content\/10.64898\/2026.02.12.26346136v1\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"study, opens in a new window\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">study<\/a>&nbsp;published this week on the preprint server medRxiv.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The retrospective study, which has not been peer-reviewed, involved 910,393 patients tested for COVID-19 at Montefiore Health System in the Bronx from March 2020 to August 2024. Follow-up lasted for up to 4.5 years. Of the 910,393 patients, 57,206 tested positive for COVID-19, and 853,187 tested negative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>OSA is estimated to affect 10% to 30% of adults worldwide. It\u2019s characterized by repeated upper-airway collapse during sleep, which leads to intermittent low oxygen levels, poor sleep, and sympathetic nervous system overactivation (\u201cfight or flight mode\u201d). The study authors noted OSA\u2019s link to cardiovascular, metabolic, and cognitive disease. Likewise, \u201chospitalization due to COVID-19 often entails prolonged immobilization, corticosteroid use, and weight gain, which are known risk factors for OSA,\u201d they wrote. \u201cEven among non-hospitalized individuals, post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 (\u201clong COVID\u201d) may impair respiratory function and sleep architecture, potentially precipitating the emergence of OSA.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cidrap.umn.edu\/covid-19\/covid-survivors-may-be-higher-risk-obstructive-sleep-apnea-45-years-post-infection\">Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CIDRAP Patients with both severe and nonsevere COVID-19 infections are at higher risk for both new-onset obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and related serious complications than their uninfected peers, Albert Einstein College of Medicine researchers report in a&nbsp;study&nbsp;published this week on the preprint server medRxiv. The retrospective study, which has not been peer-reviewed, involved 910,393 patients [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11489"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11489\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11490,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11489\/revisions\/11490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unmc.edu\/healthsecurity\/transmission\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}