Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common disorder that is often undiagnosed and untreated. When untreated, OSA is associated with significant physiologic and economic consequences. The education of physicians about OSA may increase awareness of the disorder and thus lead to a higher rate of diagnosis and treatment. Additionally, the use of an effective automated screening tool may also allow primary care providers to identify a greater number of patients at risk for OSA. The purpose of this prospective, randomized study is to evaluate the impact of an OSA educational program in conjunction with an automated OSA prediction strategy for internal medicine house officers at the Washington University School of Medicine on physician and patient outcomes. The Department of Medicine at Washington University randomizes their house officers into 3 firms for administrative, organizational and educational purposes. Members of each firm perform inpatient and outpatient rotations only with other members of their own firm. These firms will be randomized to 3 educational conditions: 1. no educational intervention, 2. an OSA didactic lecture series alone, and 3. an OSA didactic lecture series and use of an automated OSA case prediction strategy. We will test the hypotheses that an educational intervention and the use of an automated prediction strategy for OSA will help physicians identify patients with moderate to severe OSA and that this educational intervention will positively influence patients' sleep-related health. To measure the impact of the educational intervention on physician behavior, we will assess the OSA case identification rate as our primary physician outcome and test the difference in rates between firms. Our secondary physician outcome will be change in physician knowledge as measured by the Obstructive Sleep Apnea Knowledge and Attitudes questionnaire. Regarding patient outcomes, we believe that patients diagnosed with moderate to severe OSA will have improvements in sleep-specific health as measured by the Functional Outcomes of Sleepiness Questionnaire.
| Uong, Elizabeth C; Jeffe, Donna B; Gozal, David et al. (2005) Development of a measure of knowledge and attitudes about obstructive sleep apnea in children (OSAKA-KIDS). Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 159:181-6 |
