In this article you will find information about sleep problems associated with sleep apnea.
One may have relatives in the family or even themself suffer from apnea during sleep, but for them, this is just snoring. This is because you are not familiar with the signs of this problem. Here you will find valuable information you need to know about sleep apnea.
What is sleep apnea?
It is not only snoring, the problem is far bigger than that.
This is the kind of serious disturbance during sleep, resulting in irregular breathing. Irregular breathing does not occur only once, it is accompanied by long pauses. Any interruption of breathing can last from 10 to 20 seconds and occur more than 30 times per hour. Yes, you stop breathing for long - do you think it is scary to others? No, because you do not realize this, and continue to sleep.
The most common symptom of apnea is cessation of breathing during sleep for 10 seconds or more. Here we look deeper into this, and some other signs.
Other signs of apnea:
- Drop in oxygen. As mentioned above, suffering from apnea means absolute cessation of airflow or a significant reduction in breathing. When breathing stops, this leads to a reduction of at least 4 percent saturation of oxygen in the blood.
- Your sleep is disturbed/ When you are suffering from apnea, sleep is seriously disturbed. Sometimes, a person stays awake and can not sleep, other times they comes out of a deep sleep, and then sleep lightly.
- You suffer from dry throat and headache in the morning. These are other common signs of OSA. In the morning, when you wake up, your throat is usually very dry, it causes great discomfort and makes it harder to breathe. In addition, you may feel tired, not only from lack of sleep, but also to experience headaches.
As the person suffers from sleep disorders that prevent a deep and restful sleep, one often has chronic fatigue and is sleepy throughout the day. Sleep is accompanied by snoring loudly, especially late at night.
- Insufficient supply of oxygen. One of the most characteristic symptoms of OSA is a sharp drop in oxygen levels, which poses a serious threat for the cardiovascular system. This is because the cardiovascular system must increase its efforts to deliver enough oxygen to all tissues. This indirectly causes the development of high blood pressure. In the end – this increases the risk of infarct and stroke.
Once signs of OSA are known, the person must start treatment as soon as possible.
