Supplementary Material for: Obstructive Sleep Apnoea and Aortic Aneurysm: A Nationwide Population-Based Retrospective Study

<b><i>Objective:</i></b> To determine whether patients with obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) have an increased risk of aortic aneurysm (AA). <b><i>Methods:</i></b> The data for the nationwide population-based retrospective cohort study described here were obtained from the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD). We selected adult patients who had been newly diagnosed as having OSA and were followed up between 2000 and 2010. We excluded patients who had been diagnosed as having AA before the date of the new OSA diagnosis. The control cohort consisted of individuals who had no OSA history. The patients and the control cohort were selected by 1: 4 matching according to the following baseline variables: sex, age, index year, and comorbidities. The outcome measure was AA diagnosis. <b><i>Results:</i></b> In total, 31,274 patients diagnosed as having OSA were identified. Compared to patients without OSA, they had no significantly discrepant cumulative risk of developing AA in subsequent years (<i>p</i> from log-rank test = 0.442). We used the Cox proportional-hazards regression model, which found that only male sex, older age, diabetes mellitus, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and coronary artery disease were independently associated with AA occurrence among subjects with an OSA diagnosis. OSA was not associated with AA development. On the other hand, in the subgroup of COPD, patients with OSA had a higher incidence of risk of AA than those without OSA. <b><i>Conclusion:</i></b> When compared to those without OSA, patients with OSA do not have an increased AA risk.