Association of diagnosed obstructive sleep apnea with kidney transplant outcomes

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is common but underdiagnosed among patients with kidney disease. This study examines whether the diagnosis of OSA in kidney transplant recipients (KTR) affected death, death‐censored graft failure (DCGF), and acute rejection (AR). We analyzed the records of KTR who underwent transplant between 2000 and 2015. A total of 4014 kidney transplants were performed during the study period. Of these, 415 (10.3%) had a diagnosis of pretransplant OSA. Pretransplant OSA was associated with a higher risk of death in unadjusted analyses. After adjustment for potential confounders, pretransplant OSA was not associated with risk of death (HR = 1.04, 95% CI: 0.80‐1.36). Similarly, pretransplant OSA was associated with a slightly higher incidence of DCGF or AR but neither associations were significant (HR: 1.23, 95% CI: 0.85‐1.47 for DCGF; HR 1.10, 95% CI: 0.90‐1.36 for AR). A total of 117 (3.3%) were diagnosed with de novo OSA after transplant. Similar to the pretransplant OSA, unadjusted HR for death was significantly higher in the de novo OSA group (HR: 1.48, 95% CI: 1.19‐1.84); however, after adjustment, de novo OSA was not significantly associated with risk of death (HR: 1.15, 95% CI: 0.92‐1.45). Similarly, DCGF and AR rates were not significantly associated with de novo OSA (HR: 1.10, 95% CI: 0.84‐1.44 for DCGF; HR 1.10, 95% CI: 0.90‐1.33 for AR). Our work did not detect significant associations between OSA and risk of death, graft failure, and rejection but the estimates might be underestimated due to underdiagnosis of OSA.