Symptoms of sleep apnea
Among the most common sleep disorders, we find sleep apnea. Also called obstructive sleep apnea–hypopnea syndrome (OSAS), it is characterized by the occurrence of abnormally frequent episodes of interruptions (apneas) or reductions (hypopneas) in breathing during sleep.
Concretely, people who have sleep apnea stop breathing for a period of time (which generally lasts between 10 and 30 seconds). This phenomenon occurs at least 5 times per hour of sleep and can be repeated around a hundred times per night, according to the Ameli website.
This syndrome, which manifests itself by snoring, repetitive micro-arousals or even daytime sleepiness, is more present in the elderly or overweight. However, obstructive sleep apnea could be linked to an even more serious phenomenon.
Sleep apnea linked to cerebral microhemorrhages
Indeed, an international research team has discovered that obstructive sleep apnea is linked to an increased risk of developing cerebral microhemorrhages, small bleeds in the brain which are in most cases asymptomatic.
In a study published on October 28, 2025 in the review JAMA Network Open, the researchers explain that they made this discovery after analyzing and monitoring 1,441 participants from the Korean Genome and Epidemiology Study (KoGES) with moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnea.
The analyses, which took into account numerous factors such as age, sex, BMI, hypertension, diabetes and cholesterol, showed that participants with moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnea had an increased risk of developing cerebral microhemorrhages compared to a control group.
The importance of this discovery
This study therefore highlights the link between this syndrome, which affects nearly a billion adults aged 30 to 69 worldwide, according to a study published in 2019 in the journal The Lancet, and the presence of micro-hemorrhages in the brain.
If they are asymptomatic, they can present a risk to our health. Indeed, micro-hemorrhages, which increase with age, increase the risk of having a stroke, but also the risk of cognitive decline, favoring the onset of dementia and diseases such as Alzheimer's.
According to Dr. Rudy Tanzi, professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School and director of the Genetics and Aging Research Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, this study “prompts us to take this more seriously, because the damage that can result from obstructive sleep apnea may certainly be more serious than we think.”
Source: CNN
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