Obstructive sleep apnea and heart disease can be a deadly combination. That’s because sleep apnea has been found in clinical studies to worsen the already dangerous heart disease, according to the journal of the American Heart Association, Circulation.
Obstructive sleep ap900nea is categorized as a sleep disorder which causes the patient to stop and restart breathing as he or she sleeps. This can often manifest itself in snoring, and repeated waking throughout the night. The patient wakes feeling tired, lethargic, and can even suffer from depression. Not only that, but sleep apnea has been proven to worsen myriad conditions including diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, cancer, and Alzheimer’s disease.
In the Circulation article, researchers noted that between 40 and 80 percent of people with cardiovascular or heart disease also have obstructive sleep apnea. Among the population, it is estimated that 34 percent of men and 17 percent of women have obstructive sleep apnea.
Obstructive sleep apnea can have a variety of causes, but most often is caused by obesity, thick neck circumference, fatty tongue, and advanced age. It is also possible to occur in younger children and can put those children at an elevated risk of developing high blood pressure later in life, including as early as their teenage years. Though some cases of obstructive sleep apnea in children go away with time, others do not, setting those children up for what could possibly be a lifetime of medical problems.
The good news is that with treatment, researchers believe that patients can reduce their symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea, and in turn reduce the dangerous side-effects which could be worsening their heart disease symptoms.
Treatment for sleep apnea can mean many things, including continuous positive airway pressure therapy (CPAP), surgery, sleep orthotics, or some are able to reduce or eliminate sleep apnea entirely by losing weight through diet and exercise.
If you suffer from sleep apnea, Dr. Abelar can help with the assistance of a custom sleep orthotic, crafted to fit your individual mouth. Sleep orthotics eliminate the need for cumbersome and difficult to use machinery and the need for surgery. To learn more about sleep apnea solutions from Dr. Abelar, please contact the office for a consultation today.
