Grant: Project Grant

Children with sleep disordered breathing (SDB), from habitual snoring to sleep apnea, are more likely to have ADHD symptoms and poor school performance. There are limited resources to identify and treat children with SDB. Canadian children can wait up to 2 years for a sleep study. SDB treatment often includes surgical removal of enlarged tonsils or adenoids. In Edmonton, children wait up to 1 year to see a surgeon and an additional 6 months on the surgical wait-list. Taken together, children with SDB may wait several years for treatment. Our research program will address 2 of the major questions in pediatric SDB: •Can we predict which children will develop SDB? •Can we prevent childhood SDB? Why some children develop SDB is not known. Viral infections of the respiratory tract in the preschool age group are extremely common. We hypothesize that children with SDB are more likely to have a history of a viral infection compared to children without SDB. This research will leverage data from the CHILD Study Edmonton site; the first study with assessments of SDB symptoms from infancy through to 8-years of age. We will use a comprehensive antibody detection method to determine whether the child has had a prior infection from any of over 1000 strains of 206 human viral species at ages 1, 5 and 8-years. Advantages of our proposal are the broad assessment of viral infection, a very large pediatric study population (over 800 children), our ability to determine if the viral infection came before the child developed SDB symptoms, and testing for many other factors that may cause children to develop SDB. Understanding the role of viral infection on the development of SDB will help spur vaccine development and inform vaccine scheduling. Early identification and ultimately preventing childhood SDB will improve childhood neurobehavioral development while optimizing limited sleep testing and surgical resources.