Crowdsourcing Campaign Launched for Urine Test to Determine Whether Child Has Sleep Apnea or ADHD
Published on September 17, 2014
For millions of kids, a urine test could mean better, healthier sleep and possibly avoiding a mistaken diagnosis of ADHD. The East Peezy Pee Test is a new diagnostic test in development at NuSomnea that has been found to be 96.5% accurate in determining if a child has pediatric obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), according to NuSomnea. This condition is associated with symptoms often mistaken for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
This week, NuSomnea launched an Indiegogo fundraising campaign to help complete the development of the urinalysis test and to conduct another validation study in children, to confirm the results found in initial studies.
The Indiegogo campaign offers contributors perks including fun t-shirts and backpacks featuring “The Peezies,” the characters from the Easy Peezy video, as well as the Easy Peezy Pee Test when it becomes available.
The test identifies the urinary concentrations of four proteins that are predictive of pediatric OSA. “Diagnosing OSA usually requires an expensive stay at a sleep lab. It’s inconvenient for parents and uncomfortable for kids,” says Michael Thomas, co-founder of NuSomnea, in a release. “We’re changing that with a simple urine test that’s more accessible, more accurate and costs about 75% less.”
In children, common indicators of OSA are behavioral problems, learning disabilities, hyperactivity and attention problems, which may frequently be diagnosed as ADHD or ADD. Nearly 7 million children between 4 and 17 years old are currently diagnosed with ADHD, but research has reported that up to 50% might actually have pediatric OSA. Further, a large percentage of kids with ADHD respond to standard treatment for OSA-tonsil and adenoid surgery-reinforcing the conclusion that many have OSA in addition to or instead of ADHD. If a child has OSA, treating only for ADHD with stimulant drugs may not resolve the issue.
Because the Easy Peezy Pee Test is so convenient to administer, the manufacturer says it has the potential to be used as both a diagnostic tool and a disease management tool to more closely monitor therapy effectiveness and improve patient outcomes.
The Easy Peezy Pee Test by NuSomnea is still in clinical development and should be available to doctors in 2016.
