Sleep Apnea

What Is Sleep Apnea?

Sleep apnea happens either due to blockage of your airway (obstructive sleep apnea) or due to your brain not wanting to control your breathing as it should (central sleep apnea).

A lack of oxygen triggers a survival reaction that wakes you up just enough to start breathing again. Whereas that reaction keeps you alive, it also disrupts your sleep cycle. This hinders restful sleep. It can also put unneeded strain on your heart that could be a threat to your life when left untreated.

A health care provider can devise a treatment plan to help you handle symptoms and stop complications.

What Are the Kinds of This Ailment?

There are three kinds of sleep apnea:

• Central Sleep Apnea (CSA). With this kind of condition, your brain does not send signals to keep breathing-associated muscles working while you’re sleeping.
• Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). In this kind of condition, your throat muscles relax while you’re sleeping, causing surrounding tissue to put pressure on your windpipe. Blocking air movement.
• Mixed/complex Sleep Apnea. This kind is a fusion of both central and obstructive sleep apnea kinds.

How Common Is Sleep Apnea?

One study estimates that around 1 billion people (between 30 to 69 years of age) across the world have obstructive sleep apnea. Central sleep apnea is less typical than OSA but it’s not an uncommon condition.

What Are the Symptoms of Sleep Apnea?

Common symptoms of this ailment comprise:

• Waking up frequently in the middle of the night
• Breathing breaks while sleeping (a sleeping partner might notice this)
• Strange breathing patterns (fast breathing getting deeper, then more shallow again until breathing stops before beginning again)
• Snoring
• Waking up with feelings of shortness of breath or somewhat like you’re suffocating
• During the day fatigue, sleepiness or exhaustion when waking up

Other symptoms you might experience may include:

• Headaches, especially when waking up
• Night sweats
• Changes in mood (anxiety and depression)
• Feelings of restlessness at night
• Sexual dysfunction
• Sleep apnea can appear different in children.

What Causes Sleep Apnea?

This occurs because of:

• An airflow blockage in your upper airway when sleeping
• An issue with how your brain manages your breathing when sleeping

What Are Risk Factors for Sleep Apnea?

Anybody can develop this condition. It impacts children and adults. Some typical risk factors of sleep apnea comprise having:

• A biological family record of sleep apnea
• Heart conditions, a stroke or increased blood pressure
• Enlarged tonsils
• Being overweight

Your risk increases as you age. Males are more prone to receive a prognosis before age 50.

Additionally, whereas you have a higher risk of sleep apnea with being overweight, anybody of any body size can contract this condition.

What Are the Complications of Sleep Apnea?

This ailment may cause a multitude of different complications, a lot of which are serious or life-threatening. These comprise:

• Unreasonable daytime sleepiness or “micro-sleeps” whereas you fall asleep for very short periods throughout the day (dangerous when driving or operating machinery)
• Arrhythmias
• High blood pressure
• Heart damage and heart failure
• Unexpected cardiac death

Is There a Cure for Sleep Apnea?

Whereas there isn’t a cure for all types of this ailment. For instance, losing weight or surgical alternatives may cure obstructive sleep apnea. Your health care provider can give you more details concerning what this might look like for your particular circumstances.

What Can I Anticipate If I Have Sleep Apnea?

This is an ailment that can severely impede your sleep. You may not perform at your best throughout the day if you’re not getting a good night’s sleep. This could put you at risk of injury or accidents that can disrupt your work, leisure or social activities.

This ailment can also cause hindrances that may be a threat to your life. A health care provider can help you find the proper treatment option that works best for you. You might need to try a couple of different treatments or combinations to see what works best.

What’s The Life Expectancy of Someone with Sleep Apnea?

This ailments complications may decrease your life expectancy if left unaddressed. A health care provider is going to work with you to control the condition and prevent this.

A lot of factors go into establishing your life expectancy, so your health care provider is the best person to talk to concerning your situation because it may or may not be lined up with statistics.