Sleep Apnea
What is Sleep Apnea?
Sleep apnea is a common disorder that affects breathing during sleep. In sleep apnea, the muscles and soft tissue in the back of your throat and mouth relax too much, causing the airways to collapse. This restricts or stops breathing for a short time, causing you to wake up repeatedly from a sound sleep.
Sleep apnea can cause symptoms during sleep and when you’re awake. During sleep, common symptoms include snoring, gasping or choking sounds, and restlessness. The sleep disruptions caused by sleep apnea can also cause other symptoms during the day, like fatigue, headache, poor memory, and mood swings.
Often people won’t know they have sleep apnea unless a partner tells them about sleep disruptions, because fatigue during the day could be a sign of many different health issues.
If not treated early, sleep apnea can raise your risk of other conditions, heart disease, high blood pressure, and stroke.
In This Article:
What Causes Sleep Apnea?
There are a few factors that can make it more likely for people to develop sleep apnea, including:
- Enlarged tonsils
- Being overweight or obsess
- A family history of sleep apnea
- Jaw problems
Diagnosing Sleep Apnea
To find out if you have sleep apnea, your doctor will start by taking a patient history. They will ask you questions about your sleep—like how many hours you get, how long it takes you to fall asleep, if you snore or if your bed partner complains about sleep disruptions—and whether you have any family history of sleep apnea.
Your doctor may also do a physical examination to test for jaw problems, enlarged tonsils, or anything else that could be blocking your airway.
If your doctor suspects you have sleep apnea, you will likely be asked to do a sleep test at home or in a sleep center. This measures your heart rate, breathing, blood oxygen levels, and the amount of carbon dioxide in your blood during sleep.
Treating Sleep Apnea
Lifestyle changes can reduce your symptoms. These include losing weight, avoiding alcohol and sedatives such as sleeping pills, quitting smoking, and sleeping on your side instead of your back.
Many people with sleep apnea also use a machine to help keep their airways open, called a CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) or a BPAP (Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure) machine. A BPAP or CPAP machine help keep your airway open during sleep.
People who have mild to moderate sleep apnea caused by jaw problems may also be given a dental device that brings your jaw forward to keep your airway open.
How Sleep Apnea Affects COPD
Some people may have COPD and sleep apnea. This is called “overlap syndrome”. Overlap syndrome can increase your risk of developing pulmonary hypertension, hypercapnia (which is when there is too much carbon dioxide in your blood), and heart complications.
People living with COPD are already at risk of high carbon dioxide and low oxygen levels in the blood—having sleep apnea in addition increases the risk of hypercapnia and other health conditions.
What You Can Do Today
It’s never too late to adopt healthy lifestyle habits to maintain a healthy blood pressure:
- Talk to your doctor if you have any concerns about your sleep or if you have any of the symptoms described above.
- Encourage your partner to tell you about any sleep disturbances they notice.
- If you have been prescribed a CPAP or BPAP machine, make sure you use it every night as directed by your doctor.
- Get moving! Exercise helps you maintain a healthy weight and reduce your sleep apnea symptoms. Wellinks has plenty of resources to get you moving safely.
Resources
https://www.thoracic.org/patients/patient-resources/resources/obstructive-sleep-apnea-in-adults.pdf