Sleep Apnea – Diagnosing and Treating Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea causes breathing interruptions during sleep, which can lead to fatigue and health complications. It can affect people of any age or gender, but it’s more common in older adults and those who are overweight.

Your doctor can diagnose sleep apnea Russellville KY by evaluating your symptoms and medical history. They may recommend an overnight sleep study called a polysomnogram.

What is sleep apnea?

Sleep apnea is a condition that causes breathing to stop and start repeatedly during the night, leaving you without enough oxygen. It can lead to many serious health problems, including high blood pressure and heart disease, obesity, memory loss, depression, and impaired concentration and judgment. It can also lead to accidents and poor work performance.

There are two main types of sleep apnea: obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea. Obstructive sleep apnea is the most common type and occurs when your upper airway becomes blocked, which causes you to struggle for breath. This is often caused by excess weight, a thickened throat, enlarged tonsils or adenoids, nasal congestion, and alcohol consumption before sleeping.

Central sleep apnea, on the other hand, occurs when your brain fails to send proper signals to your breathing muscles. It is less common than obstructive sleep apnea, but it can be just as dangerous. Symptoms include difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep, frequent awakenings during the night, and morning headaches.

Fortunately, there are treatments for sleep apnea. These include lifestyle changes like losing weight, avoiding alcohol and sleeping in a side position. You can also use equipment that uses air pressure to keep your airway open while you sleep, such as a continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machine or bilevel positive airway pressure (BPAP) device.

Symptoms of sleep apnea

Sleep apnea is a sleeping disorder that causes breathing to stop or become shallow for short periods of time, sometimes for minutes at a time. These breathing pauses reduce the amount of oxygen in your blood and can lead to serious health problems if they aren’t treated. Some symptoms include jerking movements in your body, gasping sounds and choking during sleep, loud snoring (although not everyone who snores has sleep apnea), extreme daytime fatigue, trouble concentrating or falling asleep at work or while driving and mood changes.

Obstructive sleep apnea is the most common type of sleep apnea and occurs when your throat muscles relax and narrow or block the airway. It can occur in both men and women and is more common in older adults, but it can happen at any age. Obstructive sleep apnea has been linked to high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, diabetes, obesity, depression and a decreased quality of life.

Central sleep apnea Russellville KY is less common and occurs when your brain fails to send the proper signals to your breathing muscles during sleep. It can be found in both men and women and is most often seen in people who have had a stroke, heart disease or neurological disorders. It can also be caused by medications, including narcotics.

Diagnosing sleep apnea starts with your primary care provider who may recommend a sleep study to see how you breathe while you are sleeping. This is usually done overnight in a specialized sleep lab and involves wearing several different sensors that track your heart rate, breaths, arm and leg movement, snoring, brain activity and oxygen levels.

Diagnosis of sleep apnea

Doctors diagnose sleep apnea by reviewing the patient’s medical and family history, physical exam, symptoms, and other risk factors. The patient may be asked to keep a sleep diary and bring it to the appointment. Doctors can also use at-home or lab tests to measure the level of oxygen in the blood, heart rate and other factors that influence sleep. They can also ask about whether the patient has any medical conditions, such as high blood pressure or diabetes, or is taking medications that affect sleep and breathing. They may also ask about whether the patient has recently traveled to altitudes higher than 6,000 feet, which can cause symptoms of low oxygen levels for a few weeks afterward.

The most obvious symptom of sleep apnea is loud snoring, but it’s not always present. People with obstructive sleep apnea often have short periods of no breathing or very shallow breaths while sleeping that last for a few seconds to a minute or two. This disrupts the flow of oxygen to the brain and body. The patient may wake up unrefreshed, feel drowsy throughout the day, and have trouble concentrating and making decisions.

Untreated sleep apnea can lead to serious health problems, including high blood pressure and heart disease, stroke, depression, memory loss, obesity, diabetes, and poor work performance. The good news is that lifestyle changes, mouthpieces, and breathing devices can treat sleep apnea and prevent or reduce complications.

Treatment of sleep apnea

Our physicians and staff are specially trained to recognize, diagnose and treat sleep disorders. Our Sleep Center is equipped to evaluate adult and pediatric patients as young as four years of age. Our doctors will take a detailed history and assess the anatomic relationships with cephalometric (skull x-ray) analysis, or a flexible fiber optic camera (nasopharyngeal exam). A sleep study may be recommended to measure oxygen levels in the blood during sleep.

If you or your child snores or shows signs of sleep apnea Russellville KY, a comprehensive evaluation is important. Untreated sleep apnea can lead to high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, heart failure, stroke, depression, impotence, recurrent accidents, poor job performance and a host of other health problems.

Many people who work night shifts or change shifts frequently report sleep disturbances. Our sleep specialists can make suggestions to regulate your body’s circadian rhythm and improve the quality of your sleep. Many children with Down syndrome or other craniofacial (skull and face) anomalies are at risk for sleep apnea. Our doctors can surgically remove your child’s tonsils and adenoids to help prevent or alleviate their symptoms.