What is Sleep Apnea?
Sleep Apnea is a condition wherein a person stops breathing during the night. The breathing interruption usually lasts only a few seconds, but it can repeat many times. People who suffer from sleep apnea often snore loudly as well.
Sleep Apnea is a serious condition, and if you suspect you have it, OR if you snore or have trouble sleeping and waking refreshed, you should go to your doctor and get checked out immediately.
Although few people actually die from sleep apnea, there is a more insidious side effect. The interruption in breathing can reduce your blood oxygen level. As an example, a normal blood oxygen level is in the range of 97-100%. A person who voluntarily holds their breath can sometimes cause the blood oxygen level to go down as far as 94%.
However, sleep apnea can cause the blood oxygen level to go down as far as 40%. This is obviously very serious, and tiredness or fatigue upon waking up is the least of the concerns.
Testing for Sleep Apnea – the Sleep Study
Sleep apnea testing requires a sleep study, usually an overnight stay at a special facility when you get your own small bedroom. When you go to bed, you will be hooked up to various machines using stick-on electrodes like the type they use when you are getting an EKG. Electrodes also go around your nose to measure your breathing rate, and on your finger to measure blood oxygen.
During the night, a typical pattern is that you are first invited to sleep without any assistance, so that basic readings can be taken and the level of sleep apnea measured. After this, you may be attached to a breathing machine known as a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP). The CPAP machine pumps air to your nose as shown in the picture and the tests will show if there is a specific pressure at which your sleep apnea symptoms are reduced or removed.
Managing Sleep Apnea
The sleep study will be conducted at a special facility which will then send the report back to your doctor. The doctor will then recommend how to proceed. There are two basic approaches to managing sleep apnea – using a CPAP machine regularly, or having surgery to open up your windpipe.
The concern with surgery is that it may not be successful, and even if it is, then scar tissue and so forth will slowly negate the beneficial effect in a couple of years, and you are back to where you started. It’s very likely that a doctor will recommend a CPAP machine.
Summary
If you have sleep apnea, it is soon diagnosed and you should take steps to resolve it immediately. Unless you want to spend every night for the rest of your life with oxygen-starved blood, leading to fatigue and tiredness and even worse, it’s imperative that you take steps immediately.
