Palatopharyngeal Arch Staging System (PASS): Consensus about Oropharyngeal Evaluation

Intraoral examinations are essential in the evaluation of the upper airway in patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). The morphology of the anatomic structures of the soft palate, the tonsillar fossae, and the palatoglossus and palatopharyngeal muscles is an important determinant of the size an...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Life (Basel, Switzerland) Switzerland), 2023-03, Vol.13 (3), p.709
Main Authors: Morato, Marta, Cardona-Sosa, Maribel P, Bosco, Gabriela, Pérez-Martín, Nuria, Marte-Bonilla, Mayerin M, Marco, Alfonso, O'Connor-Reina, Carlos, Lugo, Rodolfo, Plaza, Guillermo
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Apnea
Arches
Diagnosis
Evaluation
interexaminer agreement
Longitudinal studies
Medical examination
Medical protocols
Morphology
Mouth
Muscles
obstructive sleep apnea
Oropharynx
Palate
palatopharyngeal arch
Patients
Reliability analysis
Sleep
Sleep apnea
Sleep apnea syndromes
Sleep disorders
staging system
Surgeons
Throat surgery
Tonsil
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Summary:Intraoral examinations are essential in the evaluation of the upper airway in patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). The morphology of the anatomic structures of the soft palate, the tonsillar fossae, and the palatoglossus and palatopharyngeal muscles is an important determinant of the size and collapsibility of the velum and oropharynx. The Palatopharyngeal Arch Staging System (PASS) is a systematic way to explore the oropharynx and report anatomic variations in the visible part of the palatopharyngeal muscle. In this prospective study, 30 sleep surgeons evaluated the reliability of the PASS using a selection of 23 videos of oropharyngeal examinations of healthy patients. The corresponding score on the PASS scale was graded for each examination. For internal structure and internal agreement, the Cronbach and Krippendorff alpha values were 0.96 and 0.46, which corresponded to a nearly perfect interrelationship and a moderate agreement, respectively. These findings suggest that the PASS is a valuable tool for evaluating the position of the palatopharyngeus muscle during oropharyngeal examinations and may be useful for creating a common language for sleep surgeons when evaluating the palatopharyngeal muscle.
ISSN:2075-1729
2075-1729
DOI:10.3390/life13030709