Investor Update: Sleep Apnea’s Hidden Comorbidities – And Why They Matter for BioAnalytics
Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is often seen as a “sleep issue”. In reality, it sits at the centre of a web of serious chronic diseases – and that is what makes it both a major public-health problem and, in our view, a significant opportunity for innovation.
This update looks at the broader comorbidity picture – the cluster of associated diseases that move in lockstep with untreated sleep apnea – and why BioAnalytics is focused here.
⸻
Sleep Apnea Rarely Travels Alone
Large clinical cohorts show that the vast majority of people with OSA live with at least one other chronic disease, and many have several. In one major study, around 90% of OSA patients had comorbidities, with most carrying two to four additional diagnoses.
The pattern is consistent across systems:
1. Cardiovascular disease
• OSA is present in an estimated 40–80% of patients with hypertension, heart failure, coronary artery disease and atrial fibrillation.
• Untreated OSA substantially increases the long-term risk of heart failure, stroke and coronary disease.
2. Metabolic disease
• OSA and type 2 diabetes are tightly linked via repeated oxygen drops, stress-hormone surges and chronic inflammation driving insulin resistance and weight gain.
• Obesity, poorly controlled hypertension and OSA often co-exist in a self-reinforcing loop.
3. Brain health & mental health
• Repeated nocturnal oxygen deprivation and disrupted sleep interfere with the brain’s nightly “housekeeping”, accelerating cognitive decline and dementia risk.
• Depression and anxiety are significantly more common in people with OSA; in hospital cohorts, roughly one in five patients also has diagnosed depression.
4. Safety, productivity & mortality
• Fragmented sleep and micro-awakenings drive daytime sleepiness, slower reaction times, more road and workplace accidents, and reduced productivity.
• Population studies show higher all-cause mortality in people with OSA, especially when sleep duration is short and the condition is untreated.
From a health-system and employer perspective, OSA is not a niche condition. It is a multiplier of cardiovascular, metabolic, cognitive and mental-health risk – and a drag on workforce performance.
⸻
The Cost of Doing Nothing
Economic analyses converge on the same conclusion: untreated OSA is expensive.
Health systems face higher rates of hospitalisation, cardiovascular events and diabetes-related complications. Employers see higher absenteeism, “presenteeism” and accident rates. Once you add direct medical costs to lost productivity, the annual per-patient cost runs into thousands of dollars, and national burdens into the billions.
At the same time, the standard of care is struggling:
• Traditional therapies such as CPAP are clinically effective but poorly tolerated by many patients.
• Real-world data suggest that a large proportion of patients (40%+) either never start CPAP or have stopped using it within 12 months.
• That leaves a growing pool of diagnosed but undertreated patients – and an even larger pool of people with undiagnosed OSA – continuing to drive downstream cardiovascular and metabolic disease.
This combination of high comorbidity burden, high economic cost and low long-term adherence is exactly where we believe BioAnalytics can create outsized impact.
⸻
Where BioAnalytics Fits
BioAnalytics is developing a comfortable, data-enabled oral device and sensor platform designed to:
• Make it easier for patients to be diagnosed and treated in real-world settings
• Provide continuous physiological data linking treatment of sleep apnea to improvements in blood pressure, arrhythmia burden, glycaemic control and other comorbidities
• Do so at a fraction of the cost of many existing therapies
A comfortable, lower-cost solution that treats the 40% of people who can’t use existing therapies and reduces major comorbidities makes adoption a much easier decision for health systems, insurers and employers. That’s a valuable position for a company to occupy.
Why This Matters For Investors
There is an estimated $3 billion unserved market in our space, with an available profit pool of around $980 million. To put that in context – and this is illustrative, not a forecast – our modelling suggests that capturing just 3% of the addressable market could translate to approximately $90 million in annual revenue for BioAnalytics.
By combining a comfortable, lower-cost device with high-quality clinical data and defensible IP around sleep apnea and its comorbidities, we aim to build a business that is strategically relevant to larger players across sleep, cardiometabolic and digital health.
Call me on 0400 110 644 to talk through exactly how we plan to do that.