What Causes Obstructive Sleep Apnea?
There are many different ways to treat obstructive sleep apnea today. In recent years, physicians have to come to better understand the varying types of sleep apnea in general, therefore, they have better ways to treat it. If you are diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea, this means something is directly interfering with your breathing passages. For unknown reasons, tissue will fall and block the actual airway. This can be tissue from the throat, nose or mouth. This condition can be very dangerous. When something like tissue falls blocking your airway at night and disrupting your breathing, you are not getting the proper amount of oxygen you need while sleeping. The patient will typically be advised to not sleep on their back, but their sides. This will keep the obstructive tissues from falling. If the tissue is not in the way, you can breathe normally. Enlarged tonsils can also cause blockage of the airway. If you lie on your back, you will find your tonsils cause the pressing obstruction.
Can Obstructive Sleep Apnea Become Worse?
There are several key issues which can cause obstructive sleep apnea to escalate and become worse. Alcohol is one factor. If you consume regularly, muscles used to keep the passageway open become relaxed. This will allow tissue to fall into the passageway. Obstructive sleep apnea can be escalated by certain medicines also. These include, but are not limited to, antidepressants, allergy medicine, anxiety pills and most sedatives. Someone who is overweight is also more susceptible to sleep apnea because there is an increase in the amount of tissue which can fall and obstruct you airway.
Unless your obstructive sleep apnea is so severe as to threaten the life of the sufferer, a doctor will choose the least intrusive method of treatment. One option sounds simple enough. There are dental pieces available which act to raise the jaw, forcing your airway open at night. There also happen to be devices which physically keep people from rolling over on their back at night while sleeping. These can range from a harness type of apparatus to specially made pajama tops which will prevent you from rolling over. The pajama tops have something in the back material to physically make lying on your back impossible.
Obstructive Sleep Apnea Surgery
As with most afflictions, if it is too severe obstructive sleep apnea surgery might be unavoidable. Tissue removal will cure obstructive sleep apnea. If surgery isn’t necessary, there are sleeping masks which force the air way open. This also forces air to keep the obstructive tissue at bay. You wear this at night while you sleep. This at home air treatment is sure to provide relief from obstructive sleep apnea.
Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome Most Common Form of Apnea
Obstructive sleep apnea syndrome not only affects adults but it also affects children. It is the most common form of sleep apnea and it is important to understand the causes and symptoms. Most people understand it has something to do with a person’s breathing while sleeping. They also know one of the symptoms can be excessive snoring.
Blocked Airways
Apnea means cessation of breath and in the case of a sleep apnea condition, the patient’s breath will start to turn shallow and it can even cease temporarily during their sleeping hours. In fact, such temporary cessations of breathing can occur as many as hundred times in a single night. When these episodes occur repeatedly the condition is then known as obstructive sleep apnea syndrome and when an episode occurs the diaphragm as well as chest muscles will need to push and puff in order to reopen the blocked airways.
When all this pushing and puffing goes on it can and will disturb the patient’s sleep and the body organs will also not get sufficient oxygen and the heart rhythm will also become irregular. It is therefore necessary to first understand what obstructive sleep apnea syndrome symptoms are as only then can you determine well in time whether you have this problem or not.
Common Symptoms of Obstructive Sleep Apnea Syndrome
- Sleepiness or fatigued during the day
- Experiencing sore throat or dry mouth when you wake up in the morning
- Headaches in the morning and your intellectual capabilities will be impaired
- Experience night sweats
- A sexual dysfunction problem
In the case of children suffering from obstructive sleep apnea syndrome the symptoms are not so obvious and include bedwetting, breathing through the mouth during the daytime, having difficulties in swallowing and sweating excessively at night.
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute estimate that as many over twelve million people suffer from obstructive sleep apnea syndrome. Of this number, over fifty percent of sufferers are overweight and one person out of twenty-five will be middle aged and one in fifty middle-aged females will suffer from this condition.
Obstructive sleep apnea surgery is often the last treatment option and is only recommended when all other options have been exhausted and success in treating the condition still eludes the doctors. There are several different surgery choices including uvulopapalatopharyngoplasty and tonsillectomy and/or adenoidectomy.
If you feel you may be suffering from sleep apnea or you think your partner or child is, it would be wise to consult your doctor. Potential problems can arise if left untreated.
