Diagnosis and Orthodontic Treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome Children—A Systematic Review

Abstract

Obstructive sleep apnea syndrome OSAS is a respiratory illness that is associated with recurrent episodes of either partial or full obstruction of the upper airways or apnea among other sleep disorders This study aims to analyze through a literature review whether orthodontic treatment can be a good treatment strategy for this type of disorder We performed a database search on Scopus Web of Science and Pubmed with the keywords OSA S and orthodontics to select the papers under evaluation The criteria for inclusion were articles related to OSA S children undergoing an orthodontic treatment and clinical studies or case series excluding systematic reviews narrative reviews meta-analyses adult studies animal models and in vitro studies The screening phase ended with the selection of 16 publications for this work RME or rapid maxillary expansion turned out to be the preferred orthodontic treatment in cases of pediatric OSAS The goal of this orthodontic procedure is to increase the hard palate s transverse diameter by reopening the midpalatal suture Children with maxillary contraction and dental malocclusion typically undergo such a procedure and have excellent results However OSAS is a multifactorial disorder it does not seem related to the morphology of the oral cavity and therefore it is not always possible to cope with this problem exclusively through orthodontic treatment