Snoring - serious / Apnea / Update

Do you sleep on your back? Sometimes this causes you to snore. If so, try placing a pillow on your side so you don't roll over on your back.

My wife wears earplugs, and she has a roll of duct tape bedside for me, in case I happen to get into the tequila. So far that seems to have made things more tolerable for her.

My Dad wears a device when he sleeps that is a nebulizer. It keeps moisture for his nose I guess. My Mom says that the low hum is a great improvement over the chain saw she has slept next to for 50 years

Is there a weight issue? If you have packed on the pounds, losing weight WORKS. I lost 30 lbs and stopped snoring.

Check to see if it is apnea as well. This is actually pretty dangerous as well because you stop breating in your sleep. They give you a machine with an oxygen mask that forces air into your nose during the night.

I had a player one time who had it. We went on a spring break trip and he had to bring it with him to the hotel.

i use the breathe right strips,the wife say's they work........ but she could be going into the other room too.

also i'm about 2 pork chops away from 280, that could be a reason for snoring. come to think of it i snore when i'm awake too. hmmm.

Snoring is serious!- can lead to strokes, heart attacks, H BP.

Krak-anyone else- feel free to PM me-

Happy to help as I am the Coordinator of a Sleep Disorders Center.

Players should be screened also. Craig Hansen-red sox had sleep problems and stopped breathing about 65 times per hour due to tonsils/adenoids and deviated septum. If they snore loudly, they should be screened for sleep apnea. You can google Hansen and sleep and find the story

http://www.projo.com/redsox/content/projo_20071204_hansen.677f3f65.html

Hard to react to major league come-backers on the equivalent of 2 hours sleep!

Southpaw Son could you explain exactly how snoring leads to strokes, heart attacks and other things? It's not that I disbelieve you it's just I can't bend my mind around as to how this works. I have heard / read all the same things but never a why it happens.

Thanks

coach check your PM for additional info

but for this posting :

it has an impact on the heart as each cut=off of oxygen causes the heart to slow down and then after Co2 builds, the person wakes and the heart starts to rapidly beat to deliver oxygen to the body/brain. this constant ramping up and down all night of the heart creates havoc over the long hall. Depriving the heart of oxygen is obviously a severe situation,

Blood pressure doesnt dip with these folks as it should when you sleep.

I have done hundreds of these studies and watched people have a heart pause for up to 8 seconds while they try to break through an apnea. I have seen folks go almost a full minute or longer without breathing and their oxygen levels fall to meaningless values instead of a value in the 90s like a healthy person would have while asleep

They also end up with hardened arteries due to this frequent oxygen deprivation and suffer up to a 3 time higher risk of stroke.

Thanks for all the good info. I'm a complete side-sleeper (flippin' and floppin', but never on back or stomach). I asked my wife to describe any patterns or unusual things she might have noticed when I snore and she said generally I'll be snoring for awhile then suddenly wake up.....and that's most often about 4 hours into my sleep....then I am wide awake and go out to the couch, watch Seinfeld DVDs, and eventually fall asleep again. This scenario has unfolded almost every night for the past two years......

I could certainly stand to lose 30-40 pounds, and maybe that would help kick it. Problem is, I've been trying off and on to lose that weight for years and years and don't make much progress -- probably due to always being tired, then eating to try and perk up......it's a vicious cycle (or circle)!!

KRAK...
...this sounds A LOT like sleep apnea. I would suggest a visit to a doctor as the sleep apnea can be a sign or lead to a serious cardiac condition. Think of Reggie White...

Krak,

30-40 lbs is a tall order. With a goal of losing 20, my wife (she's a PT) has me on a low carb/low fat diet. It took some getting used to, but I found I can actually live without bread and pasta. The weight is coming off (10lbs. over 30 days) and I'm feeling much better throughout the day. No energy dips after lunch, and no naps when I get home from work. Might be worth a try.

I saw a TV advertisement just recently about a product that you pop in your mouth at night as you sleep. It looked sorta like a mouth piece....???

I'm waiting on mine to arrive! lol.....j/k.

I've lost about 25lbs since September from dieting and exercise 5 days a week. My wife said that the snoring has "slowed down" a good bit which I will take!

.

Get rid of those Seinfeld DVDs and you'll be fine Krak.





Not that there is anything wrong with them.

Southpaw son,

My son, now 8, had to have his tonsils and adenoids removed because of sleep apnea. Not only did it wreak havoc on his sleep, but the resulting loss of rack-time caused severe behavioral problems. Once the tonsils and adenoids were gone, he started sleeping through the night and his behavior improved tremendously.

Sleep Disorder Centers are a true blessing!

quote:

Originally posted by 27"sDad:
Southpaw son,

My son, now 8, had to have his tonsils and adenoids removed because of sleep apnea. Not only did it wreak havoc on his sleep, but the resulting loss of rack-time caused severe behavioral problems. Once the tonsils and adenoids were gone, he started sleeping through the night and his behavior improved tremendously.

Sleep Disorder Centers are a true blessing!

Thanks for the kind words. You are lucky someone picked up on your childs sleep. Too often this is missed and the behavior is misdiagnosed as ADD when it is simply a tired child that cant sleep. Usually the tonsils and adenoids are the cause. Kids should not be snoring unless they have a cold.

Some kids have tonsils so large that they literally seal up the airway when the child dozes off to sleep.

These kids act out, are hyper, cant focus due to their sleep deprivation.

Glad to hear it worked out for you.

Southpaw Son,

You're very welcome.

His Pediatrician referred him after listening to our "tales of woe", as a precursor to an ADD diagnosis. The Sleep Center discovered the problem, and the surgery worked like a charm.

Southpaw son- I was reading your thread that snoring can cause arteries to harden leading to stroke, has there been any connections made between snoring an Alzheimer's?

quote:

Originally posted by deldad:
Southpaw son- I was reading your thread that snoring can cause arteries to harden leading to stroke, has there been any connections made between snoring an Alzheimer's?

Well, I should clarify, not everyone that snores has apnea. It is the impact from the apnea that causes the sroke connection. Usually if your snoring is loud enough to be a disturbance to a bed partner (or the neighbors down the street! ) than some degree of apnea is present.

Wow!- i cant believe that a few weeks after I registered here,and without any mention in my profile of my work, the topic of snoring came up!- fate!

and Alzheimers as well!!- My mom has Alzheimers and when I was a teen (35 years ago) I used to watch her fall asleep at the TV each evening with long periods of silence (which later once I became I sleep tech, I realized were long apneas) and then a loud snore.

Later on, she developed severe Alzheimers. She is still alive but really lost within herself and though I get to visit her (she still lives with my dad) she really has no clue as to who i am. It is a truly terrible disease.

This made me also wonder if there was a connection.

It would make sense that long periods of oxygen deprivation to the brain would cause plague build up as well as memory interference. And i also banter with fellow sleep professionals that there are no young people with alzheimers so why is it so far fetched to think that this apnea over the long term doesnt impact the memory areas of the brain in a permanent fashion.

They are doing some research in this area and have found cognitive improvement with Alzheimers patients that are using CPAP treatment. CPAP is a mask that the apea patient uses to splint their airway and prevent the apneas. I will PM some info to you that I have on my computer. It is interesting to research further. Also, I wonder if folks who have severe apnea and experience micro-sleeps and memory problems due to their undiagnosed apnea, are misdiagnosed as having onset of Alzheimers.

The jury is out,some docs have claimed it is not a cause but I am leaning towards a connection of the two. The prevalence of apnea in the dementia patient is reported as high as 70%-80%! In the general population the rate is about 10% It definetely seems to be a long term attack on the brain and the death of cells .

great question! - I will keep you posted if I see any new research cross my desk.

Sorry for running so long here!

Southpaw Son,

I am truly sorry about your mother. My wife was diagnosed with early onset Dementia/Alzheimers close to 2 years ago. It is a terrible disease, even in its early stages.