Preliminary data from two recent studies presented at the 31st United Professional Association for Sleep suggest that mild-to-moderate obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) can increase the risk of hypertension and diabetes. Investigators Alexandros N. Vgontzas et al. of the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine analyzed a Pennsylvania adult cohort of 1,741 subjects for a detailed medical history and evaluated them in a sleep laboratory over a one-night period. There were 787 apnea hypopnea index (AKI) <30 without comorbid hypertension and 1,250 AKI <30 without comorbid diabetes at baseline; they were reassessed at ten years. an AKI of 5 to 14.9 was considered mild OSA, and an AKI of 15 to 29.9 was considered moderate OSA. the results found that the prevalence of hypertension and diabetes at ten years were, respectively 25.2% and 10.2%, respectively. Multifactorial corrected analysis showed that mild to moderate OSA could increase the risk of hypertension even without symptoms; specifically, the corrected ORs for the development of hypertension in patients with mild and moderate OAS were 4.35 (95% CI: 2.25-8.39) and 3.80 (95% CI: 1.41-10.30), respectively, compared with those without OSA. In addition, the correlation between OSA and hypertension was stronger in younger adults compared to those who were relatively older (p-value of 0.01 for the interaction between OSA and age). In addition, moderate OSA was found to increase the risk of diabetes (OR=2.78, 95% CI: 1.17-6.63); mild OSA did not (OR=0.47, 95% CI: 0.18-1.19). The results of this study suggest that early detection and treatment of mild-to-moderate OSA is important for the prevention of cardiometabolic diseases in young and middle-aged people. In the future, there is a need for annual metabolic symptom monitoring and lifestyle interventions for young and middle-aged populations. Shalini Paruthi, spokesperson for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, commented that the study suggests that sleep apnea, even mild sleep apnea, is associated with hypertension. In the future, more research is needed to further explore the association between sleep apnea and diabetes.