Thursday, April 14, 2011

Can Sleep Apnea Be Deadly?

Dr. Brandon Peters recently covered a topic in his sleep blog on About.com that few of us want to think about: why sleep apnea may be deadly. Those who snore or have been diagnosed with sleep apnea likely experience pauses in their breathing. Whether this is caused by airway obstruction or by the brain forgetting to prompt a breath, oxygen levels drop, carbon dioxide levels rise, and a spike in blood pressure, heart rate and hormones occur as the body wakes to breathe. This happens multiple times during the night—and that’s hard on your body.

In addition, many folks with sleep apnea tend to have high blood pressure or hypertension, which increases the risk of heart attack, stroke, and other problems. Sleep apnea can also lead to the activation of the sympathetic nervous system—the “fight-or-flight” response as well as problems with the lining of blood vessels, inflammation and metabolic regulation…all of which can build up to a heart attack.

Science Daily also published a story about folks with sleep apnea and their risk of suffering a stroke. According to research by Dr. Roberto Munoz, people with serious sleep apnea have 2.5 times more possibility of suffering a stroke. Dr. Peters also covers the strong association between stroke and sleep apnea and approximately 40-60% of people with stroke are found to have obstructive sleep apnea.  Whoa.

Most of us have heard about Reggie White’s sudden death from sleep apnea. In Dr. Peters article he mentions that “In a study of patients who died suddenly who had had recent sleep studies performed, it was shown that almost half of the patients with sleep apnea died between the hours of midnight to 6 a.m., compared with 21% without sleep apnea. It is possible that these individuals died suddenly during periods of apnea.”

Lesson to us all: if you snore or think you could have sleep apnea, have it checked out. If you have sleep apnea and own a CPAP, use it. Not only will you sleep better, it could save your life.

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