Sleep apnea solutions: Breathless no more

by Vincent Ma

After reading several posts here on the subject of the sleep apnea, I just thought I would add my two cents worth. First of all snoring is not normal. As men, we tend to think that snoring is macho, my father snored, my grandfather snored and my uncle snored so it's natural that I should snore. Snoring itself is not an indication of sleep apnea; however, if the snoring is frequently interrupted by periods of silence followed by a gagging or choking reflex is usually indicative of an episode. Severe sleep apnea (and what insurances look for) is an AHI of 15 or greater. AHI stands for Apnea-Hypopnea Index and an episode of sleep apnea occurs when a person stops breathing for 10 seconds or longer. The AHI is an hourly average during sleeping hours. So an AHI of 15 means that for every hour that you were asleep you stopped breathing for 10 secs or more, 15 times an hour.

Your body will react to the lack of oxygen by increasing your heart rate to increase your blood flow and "wake" you up. Most people do not become consciously awake, they only get out of REM sleep and slowly fall back into deep sleep.

The reason that sleep apnea has taking center stage in health is because sleep apnea has been linked to high blood pressure, stroke and other cardiovascular diseases. Sleep Apnea is also blamed for a large percentage of automobile accidents.

Treatments range from lifestyle changes, oral devices, CPAP, minimally invasive surgery and major surgery:

Lifestyle changes include losing weight, which helps reduce pressure on the airway, sleeping on your side, exercising to increase muscle tone and dietary changes.

Oral devices are like mouth guards that you wear while sleeping. When you bite down on them it moves your jaw slightly forward to reduce the blocking of your airway. However, many patient complain of discomfort and excessive drooling.

CPAP is by far the most common treatment and usually the first-line of treatment. CPAP stands for Constant Positive Airway Pressure, and the machine just blows air to help keep your air passage open. CPAP technology has come a long way and now there is APAP (Auto-Adjusting) and BPAP (Bi-level). Both of these machines offer more comfort features to normal CPAP and just makes it easier to exhale. There are many different types of masks and more of them are becoming less obtrusive. As you can guess the major complaint of CPAP is the mask and the noise, but I can assure you at CPAP machines are now near silent and the newest mask that I have seen is not much larger than a snorkel.

There are a couple of different new surgical procedures that have recently been introduced that are just out patient procedures. The most popular is called the Pillar System by Restore Medical. The entire procedure involves three small incisions on the roof of your mouth and three pillars inserted. This makes the top of your mouth more rigid and less likely to block your airway.

The last option is the most severe and involves breaking your jaw and moving it forward to increase your airway. This procedure is now not often done except as a last resort.

I hope this helps to clarify a few myths about sleep apnea.

Learn more about this author, Vincent Ma.