Sleep apnea symptoms must be caught in order to get to the doctor and
get a proper diagnosis. After this has been done, you can find the
treatment you need for your ailment. While it has long been downplayed
on a widespread basis, the condition can cause a host of health
problems, not the least of which is insomnia and heart attack. If you
can come to the realization that you might be suffering, you can get to a
good doctor quickly and begin treatment.
It’s important to understand why sleep apnea can be such a dangerous
condition to live with. Put in simple terms, the condition means that at
some point (or multiple points) during the night, the person with the
condition stops breathing. When this happens, you will either naturally
remove the blockage and continue breathing on your own, or possibly wake
up. Either way, it often takes the user out of the deep REM sleep that
everyone requires. Interrupted deep sleep on a continuous basis can have
many of the same effects as chronic insomnia, including many serious
heart problems.
Symptoms one can look for are weight gain and chronic fatigue. This
fatigue may be especially pronounced in the early morning and manifest
itself as one might feel when they didn’t get enough hours of sleep. It
is typically not cured by going to bed earlier, either. Loud, constant
snoring is another common symptom of sleep apnea, though unfortunately
many people are not aware of their snoring. Take it seriously if your
significant other or a roommate tells you that you snore loudly. While
it may mean nothing, it could be a sign of something more serious.
If a doctor diagnoses you with sleep apnea, treatment could take a
number of different forms. If you’re on a class of medication known as
opioids, the doctor will likely decrease these medications as they have
been linked to the condition. Some sufferers are prescribed an oxygen
tank to use while they are sleeping. By far the most common treatment,
however, is the use of a CPAP machine. CPAP stands for continuous
positive airway pressure and it is basically a machine that forces
continuous oxygen into your lungs. While some patients have trouble
adjusting to sleeping with the machine, they usually get used to it over
time. If not, there are automatic machines which adjust airway pressure
throughout the night according to need that could be better for a
sensitive sleeper.
