Electroencephalography Theta/Beta Ratio Decreases in Patients with Severe Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Jingjing Li; Jingyuan You; Guoping Yin; Jinkun Xu; Yuhuan Zhang; Xuemei Yuan; Qiang Chen; Jingying Ye

doi:10.2147/NSS.S357722

Electroencephalography Theta/Beta Ratio Decreases in Patients with Severe Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Nat Sci Sleep. 2022 May 30:14:1021-1030. doi: 10.2147/NSS.S357722. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Jingjing Li¹, Jingyuan You², Guoping Yin¹, Jinkun Xu¹, Yuhuan Zhang¹, Xuemei Yuan¹, Qiang Chen¹, Jingying Ye^{1

3}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Otorhinopharyngology-Head and Neck Surgery, Beijing Tsinghua Changgung Hospital, School of Clinical Medicine, Tsinghua University, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
² Department of Biomedical Engineering, School of Medicine, Tsinghua University, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
³ Institute of Precision Medicine, Tsinghua University, Beijing, People's Republic of China.

Abstract

Purpose: Accumulating evidence suggests that theta/beta ratio (TBR), an electroencephalographic (EEG) frequency band parameter, might serve as an objective marker of executive cognitive control in healthy adults. Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) has a detrimental impact on patients' behavior and cognitive performance while whether TBR is different in OSA population has not been reported. This study aimed to explore the difference in relative EEG spectral power and TBR during sleep between patients with severe OSA and non-OSA groups.

Patients and methods: 142 participants with in-laboratory nocturnal PSG recording were included, among which 100 participants suffered severe OSA (apnea hypopnea index, AHI > 30 events/hour; OSA group) and 42 participants had no OSA (AHI ≤ 5 events/h; control group). The fast Fourier transformation was used to compute the EEG power spectrum for total sleep duration within contiguous 30-second epochs of sleep. The demographic and polysomnographic characteristics, relative EEG spectral power and TBR of the two groups were compared.

Results: It was found that the beta band power during NREM sleep and total sleep was significantly higher in the OSA group than controls (p < 0.001, p = 0.012, respectively), and the theta band power during NREM sleep and total sleep was significantly lower in the OSA group than controls (p = 0.019, p = 0.014, respectively). TBR during NREM sleep, REM sleep and total sleep was significantly lower in the OSA group compared to the control group (p < 0.001 for NREM sleep and total sleep, p = 0.015 for REM sleep). TBR was negatively correlated with AHI during NREM sleep (r=-0.324, p < 0.001) and total sleep (r=-0. 312, p < 0.001).

Conclusion: TBR was significantly decreased in severe OSA patients compared to the controls, which was attributed to both increased beta power and decreased theta power. TBR may be a stable EEG-biomarker of OSA patients, which may accurately and reliably identify phenotype of patients.

Keywords: OSA; frequency band ratio; sleep electroencephalography; spectral power; theta/beta ratio.

Grants and funding

This study was supported by grants No. 81873696 from the National Natural Science Foundation of China.