An epilepsy drug could help those with sleep apnoea relieve their symptoms which includes loud snoring.

A new study presented at the European Respiratory Society congress in Vienna found that patients given the drug sulthiame saw a reduction in symptoms of the stop-start breathing condition.

Obstructive sleep apnoea is estimated to affect 1.5 million adults in the UK and can lead to serious issues such as high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease and stroke.

What are the symptoms of sleep apnoea?

Symptoms include breathing that stops and starts, making gasping, snorting or choking noises, waking up a lot and loud snoring.

Losing weight can sometimes help treat the condition. Giving up smoking and cutting down on alcohol can also help but many people also need a continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machine throughout the night.

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In the new study, experts looked at the drug sulthiame as a possible alternative treatment to CPAP which involves a face mask and can be uncomfortable to use.

Professor Jan Hedner, from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, who presented the research, said: “The standard treatment for obstructive sleep apnoea is sleeping with a machine that blows air through a face mask to keep the airways open.

“Unfortunately, many people find these machines hard to use over the long term, so there is a need to find alternative treatments.

“We also a need better understanding of the underlying mechanisms in obstructive sleep apnoea to help clinicians give more personalised treatment.”

The trial involved 298 people with obstructive sleep apnoea from 28 different centres in Spain, France, Belgium, Germany and the Czech Republic.

All the patients could not tolerate or refused to use CPAP machines.

Tests were carried out at the start of the study then four and 12 weeks later to look at breathing, levels of oxygen in the blood, heart rhythm, eye movements, and brain and muscle activity during a night of sleep.

The patients were divided into four groups: 74 people took 100mg of sulthiame daily; 74 took 200mg; 75 took 300mg and the remaining 75 took a placebo pill.

The study found that people taking sulthiame had fewer pauses in their breathing and higher levels of oxygen in their blood during sleep.

For example, a measure of the frequency of respiratory pauses during sleep, called AHI3a, was 17.8% lower for patients taking the lowest dose, 34.8% lower for patients on the medium dose and 39.9% lower for patients on the highest dose.

Patients who had been feeling sleepy during the daytime also felt less sleepy when they took sulthiame.

Prof Hedner said: “People taking sulthiame in the trial had a reduction in obstructive sleep apnoea symptoms such as stopping breathing during the night and feeling sleepy during the day.

“Their average levels of oxygen in the blood were also improved with the treatment. This suggests that sulthiame could be an effective treatment for obstructive sleep apnoea, especially for those who find they cannot use the existing mechanical treatments.

“Although sulthiame is already available as a treatment for childhood epilepsy, we still need to carry out a phase III study to confirm the beneficial respiratory effects of this drug in a larger group of patients with obstructive sleep apnoea.”

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Professor Sophia Schiz, from the University of Crete, who was not involved in the research, said: “This is one of the first studies to suggest that a drug treatment could help some patients and the results are promising.

“We need to continue testing sulthiame and other treatments to understand their long-term effects, including any side effects.”

Erika Radford, head of health advice at Asthma and Lung UK, said: “What’s interesting about this research is it’s a first step in moving people away from breathing equipment you wear while you’re asleep, to a drug-based treatment.”

The research has not yet been peer-reviewed or published in a medical journal.