Therefore, all analyses were performed on a total subject cohort of 13 patients with OSA and 11 control subjects. Table 1 shows baseline data for 13 patients with

OSA and 11 healthy controls before rTMS. There were no significant differences between groups in age, height or handedness, but patients were 29% heavier and had a 26% greater BMI than controls. Subjective daytime sleepiness (as measured by the ESS) was also significantly higher in patients than controls. Assessment of physical activity showed no significant differences between groups for the index of work activity, but controls showed a 22% higher activity index during leisure time and a 31% higher index of sporting AUY-922 cell line activity than patients. Patients with OSA showed severe OSA (i.e. AHI > 30 events/h), with significantly higher AHI and significantly lower average and minimum O2-saturation during both NREM and REM sleep (Table 1). Patients also demonstrated a significantly higher proportion of sleep time spent with O2-saturation below 90%,

and significantly elevated total and respiratory-related AIs. Although sleep efficiency was not significantly different between groups, there was a significant main effect of sleep stage (F3,22 = 58.27, P < 0.001), and a significant sleep stage × group interaction effect (F3,66 = 3.58, P = 0.02) in percent time within each sleep stage. A subsequent one-way anova showed that patients with OSA spent significantly more time in NREM Stage 1 than controls. There were no other significant group differences in other sleep stages (Table 1). RMT and DNA-PK inhibitor the TMS intensity producing MEP1 mV were Phosphatidylethanolamine N-methyltransferase both significantly higher in patients, whereas AMT just failed to reach statistical

significance between groups (Table 1). Figure 1A and B shows the average responses for SICI and LICI compared between each group in each stimulus condition. A significant main effect of conditioning intensity was found for SICI, with higher intensity conditioning stimuli resulting in increased inhibition in FDI (F2,314 = 23.27, P < 0.001). However, there was no difference between groups (F1,23 = 0.98, P = 0.33) or group × conditioning intensity interaction effect (F2,314 = 0.31, P = 0.74). A significant main effect of ISI was also found for LICI, with increased inhibition at the shorter ISI (F1,236 = 36.51, P < 0.001). This analysis also showed no difference between groups (F1,27 = 0.56, P = 0.46) and no group × ISI interaction (F1,236 = 0.32, P = 0.57). An example of mean MEPs obtained before and after rTMS is shown for one patient with OSA and one control subject in Fig. 2A. Representative subjects are matched for age (control, 51 years; patient, 49 years), height (control, 175 cm; patient, 173 cm) and weight (control, 91 kg; patient, 85 kg), whereas patient AHI was 22.4 events/h compared with the control value of 4.3 events/h.