Abstract □ 7

Central sleep apnea is a common respiratory pattern in healthy neonates. Nevertheless, frequent central sleep apnea associated with drops in oxygen saturation may contribute to infantile morbidity. Therefore a treatment for severe central sleep apnea in infancy would be of practical implication. Recently low dose acetazolamide was shown to reduce symptomatic central sleep apnea in adults. The effect of the drug in neonates was tested. Twelve neonates (42 [40 -44]Footnote 1 weeks of conceptional age) were included in our study. In all cases the central apnea index was >30/h (apnea ≥ 2 sec). The duration of cumulative drops in oxygen saturation below 90% (=DCDOS<90%) was more than 0.5 h per night (10 h). All individuals received 7 mg/kg/day acetazolamide PO (divided in 3 doses) for 11 weeks. Polysomnography was recorded 10 h before the first dose and continued for 10 h after the third dose. It was repeated after 6 weeks of treatment and one week after acetazolamide was ceased. Blood gas and electrolyte analysis in regular intervals during therapy revealed normal results. No adverse effects were reported by the parents. Comparison of the respiratory results before and after treatment (10 h recording after the third dose) showed the following results: a decrease in central apnea index from 49 [31-74]*/h to 20 [7-33]*/h, a decrease in DCDOS<90% from 0.6 [0.5-1.1]*h/10h to 0.0 [0.0-0.2]*h/10h and an increase in basal oxygen saturation from 95% [94-97%]* to 98% [96-99]*. The improved respiratory results remained stable 12 weeks later.