MacKay SG, Lewis R, McEvoy D, Joosten S, Holt NR. Surgical management of obstructive sleep apnoea: A position statement of the Australasian Sleep Association. Respirology. 2020 Dec;25(12):1292-1308. doi: 10.1111/resp.13967. Epub 2020 Nov 15. PMID: 33190389; PMCID: PMC7839593.
The charge of the Australasian Sleep Association Surgical Writing group was to produce a document that analysed 4 levels of data in relation to sleep surgery: (a) individual RCTs, Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses, (b) large individual cohort/observational or multi-centre studies (c) lower level studies but sufficient for ISSS per surgicalsleep.org listing and (d) articles regarding judgment of sleep surgery.
Also in the document were developed several algorithms, suggesting what type of surgeries might be applied in favourable and not so favourable anatomical scenarios.
Overall, surgical treatments in adult populations are now supported by high levels of evidence and have been specifically tested in randomized and other trials. The Position Statement highlights this fact and provides a strong argument for sleep surgical paradigms.