Sleep Apnea
Melanie McGrath
Sleep Apnea is a common disorder in which you have one or more pauses in breathing or shallow breaths while you sleep. Breathing pauses can last from a few seconds to minutes. They often occur five to thirty times or more an hour. Typically, normal breathing then starts again, sometimes with a loud snort or choking sound. It is usually a chronic condition that disrupts your sleep 3 or more nights each week. You often move out of deep sleep and into light sleep when your breathing pauses or becomes shallow. This results in poor sleep quality that makes you tired during the day. Sleep apnea is one of the leading causes of excessive daytime sleep. [i]
There are three types of Sleep Apnea; obstructive, central and mixed. Obstructive is caused by a blockage of the airway, usually when the soft tissue in the rear of the throat collapses and closes during sleep. In central sleep apnea, the airway is not blocked but the brain fails to signal the muscles to breathe. Mixed apnea is a combination of the two. With each type of apnea, the brain briefly arouses people with sleep apnea in order for them to resume breathing but consequently sleep is extremely fragmented and of poor quality. [ii]
Men are more likely to have obstructive sleep apnea than women before the age of fifty, however, after age 50, the risk is the same in men and women. Among obese patients, 70% have obstructive sleep apnea. Among cardiac patients, 30-50% have obstructive sleep apnea and among patients with strokes, 60% have sleep apnea. African-Americans have a 2.5 times greater risk of sleep apnea than Caucasians. If you have obstructive sleep apnea, your airway can be blocked or narrowed during sleep because your throat muscles and tongue relax more than normal, or your tongue and tonsils are large compared to the opening into your windpipe. Also the shape of your head and neck may cause a smaller airway size in the mouth and throat area.
Patients with disrupted sleep cannot concentrate, think or remember as well during the day. This has been known to cause more accidents in the work place and while driving. Sleep Apnea can cause high blood pressure and heart problems. The risk for congestive heart failure increases by 2.3 times and the risk of stroke by 1.5 times with obstructive sleep apnea. [iii]
There are treatment options, for milder cases of sleep apnea, your doctor may recommend lifestyle changes such as losing weight or quitting smoking. If these measures don’t improve your symptoms or if your apnea is moderate to severe, a number of other treatments are available. If you have moderate to severe sleep apnea, you may benefit from a machine that delivers air pressure through a mask placed over your nose while you sleep. With Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) the air pressure is somewhat greater than that of the surrounding air and is just enough to keep your upper airway passage open, preventing apnea and snoring. Another option is wearing an oral appliance designed to keep your throat open. Some are designed to open your throat by bringing your jaw forward, which can sometimes relieve snoring and mild sleep apnea. For more serious situations surgery to remove tissue from the back of the throat can be performed. [iv]
Remember to always talk to your health care provider about your condition and ask what you can do to get a better night’s sleep.
Sources:
[i] National Heart Lung and Blood institute (2008) “Sleep Apnea” http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/
[ii] American Sleep Apnea Association (2008) “Sleep Apnea Information” http://www.sleepapnea.org/
[iii] Medicinenet.com (2008) “Sleep Apnea” http://www.medicinenet.com/
[iv] MayoClinic.com (2008) “Sleep Apnea” http://www.mayoclinic.com/