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The Epworth Sleepiness Scale in CSA?
How confident are you in calculating the Epworth scale?
I felt very scary on this subject. So please practice this case as it is important not only in your CSA but also in our GP Surgery.
If you suspect that a patient is suffering from sleep apnoea, the easiest thing is to assess them using the Epworth sleepiness scale .
This is a series of questions to assess how tired someone.
Generally, a score above 10 indicates that further investigation and a sleep study are necessary.
This can be done in a variety of ways, such as using screening pulse oximetry or by using polysomnography machines, including portable devices that can be taken home, which do the same as hospital-based overnight studies without the video component.
Most sleep studies measure oxygen saturation as well as apnoea-hypopnoea index, body position, pulse and loudness of snoring.
Example questions to ask patients:
How likely are you to doze off or fall asleep in the following situations, in contrast to feeling just tired?
(This refers to your usual way of life in recent times).
Even if you have not done some of these things recently try to work out how they would have affected you.
Use the following scale to choose the most appropriate number for each situation:
0 = would never doze / sleep
1 = little chance of dozing / sleep
2 = moderate chance of dozing / sleep
3 = likely to doze / sleep
The higher the score you have gathered , the greater the likelihood that your problems caused by sleep apnoea.
Note that the test can never replace a medical diagnosis.
If you’re concerned about sleep apnoea, contact and refer to the secondary care for further investigations.
| Situation | Chances of falling asleep – 0-3 | |||
| 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| Sitting and reading | ||||
| Watching TV | ||||
| Sitting without doing anything active (meeting, theatre etc) | ||||
| A passenger in a car for an hour | ||||
| Lying and relaxing | ||||
| Sitting and talking to someone | ||||
| Quiet lunch with no alcohol | ||||
| Stopping at traffic lights, while driving a car | ||||
| SCORE: | ||||
Interpretation based on your score:
0-8 — Normal sleep
8-10 — Average amount of sleep
10-15 —May have excess sleep depending on the situation
16-24 — Excessively sleepy and should seek medical attention.
To Your Success,
Hema xoxo.