SLEEP APNEA AND CARDIOHEALTH
Andre mark found himself in good company when his wife informed him he was snoring-- a lot--and he was diagnosed with sleep apnea.
About 4-percent of middle-aged men suffer from obstructive sleep apnea--a blockage of their airway…that literally stops them from breathing many times a night.
“I had done a test – which is a recording device that uh fits in the nose and tells you how much snoring you have. It turned out to be a lot of snoring,” says Andre.
Aside from the bother to significant others-- doctors have long known that sleep apnea and snoring can leave patients feeling sluggish and tired – at the end of a good night’s rest. And they have also suspected it was doing more damage. Now, a new study confirms that hunch.
Dr. Jordan Josephson, a sinus and snoring expert at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York, says, “We know that sleep apnea causes cardiac disease and actually probably is an inciting factor in men especially dying in their sleep.”
Researchers in Spain studied healthy men as well as those with mild, moderate and severe apnea. They found a significantly increased risk of heart attack and stroke in men with the worst form of the disease—who had done nothing to treat it.
“This is something that seems irksome but really is life and death,” Dr. Josephson states. He says patients should view snoring as a warning sign. “The first part of the obstruction causes some snoring. After the obstruction gets worse—you end up with apnea.”
The danger lies in the oxygen level in your blood which drops when you stop breathing, and your heart muscles and lungs are deprived.
There are however options for patients.
“We have a new procedure for snoring and mild sleep apnea which can be done in an office visit with numbing of the palate and putting of stents into the palate,” states Dr. Josephson.
Both the pilar procedure and what the researchers studied—C-PAP,or forced air into your nose--seem to reduce apnea and these cardiovascular risks.
Andre, who got the pilar procedure, now rests easy, without any snoring and less risk of a heart attack or stroke.
Related Stories Links:
|