Medical Advices for Students

Posts Tagged ‘cause sleep apnea’

There are no drugs to treat sleep apnea, but several treatments are effective for sleep apnea when administered alone or in combination:

• Changes related to lifestyle – to eliminate factors that cause or aggravate the sleep apnea. If apnea is attributable to obesity, weight loss often solves the problem. In addition, sleep lying on its side, quitting smoking, avoiding alcohol and sedatives (these substances aggravate snoring and affect control of breathing) are useful measures to alleviate sleep apnea.

• Applying a constant positive pressure air – a well fitting face mask connected to an air pump, can administer a constant airflow in the airway to prevent their collapse and clog. Until now, the treatment that has proved most effective, whatever the cause of sleep apnea. Patients often find a significant difference after one or two nights. Read the rest of this entry »

The obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), the most common form, occurs when the air has trouble reaching the lungs because the airways are obstructed. OSA is more common in males and overweight persons, especially those who sleep on their backs. In people of normal weight who have apnea, it’s often an abnormality of the lower face, especially a small chin, an overbite (overlap) or a large tongue. Characteristically, the AOS occurs in three phases:

* initially, the airway is partially blocked because the soft tissue at the back of the throat relaxes and starts to close up on itself, producing very loud snoring.
* Second, the airway is completely blocked and breathing stops for at least 10 seconds, sometimes up to two minutes.
* Finally, the person wakes up briefly (she rarely remembers) and struggling to breathe, snorting or gasping. After regaining her breath, she falls back asleep and the cycle begins again. Read the rest of this entry »