A Little Sleep Talk
Although it is not my intention to use this forum to talk about sleep, I must say a “few” words about it. We are all aware of the importance that good nutrition and exercise are key elements to staying healthy. Just as important, though, is the need for healthy, restful, restorative sleep every night to help our body and mind recover, heal and be rejuvenated when the sun rises in the morning. The benefits of good nutrition and exercise are maximized with the addition of good sleep.
If I were to list some symptoms and health issues that may indicate that you are not getting the kind of sleep you need, they would include snoring, witnessed pauses in your breathing (10 seconds or more) headaches in the morning, memory loss, EDS (excessive daytime sleepiness) weight gain, hypertension (or high blood pressure), diabetes, heart attack, stroke, increased irritability, Alzheimer’s disease and dementia. I’m sure I missed a few but when you consider that these symptoms and health issues may be telling you that you may have sleep apnea, you need to know that at least some of these can be minimized with treatment, using a cpap (continuous positive airway pressure) machine. A few alternative choices, instead of cpap do exist but treatment with positive airway pressure remains as the “gold standard” for dealing with apnea. Left untreated, sleep apnea can change your life suddenly (heart attack, stroke) and will certainly have a cumulative negative impact on your health in other ways that you may or may not be aware of, namely daytime sleepiness, weight gain, diabetes, increased irritability and the list goes on.
So what qualifies me to talk about good sleep. First and foremost, I treat my own sleep apnea symptoms every night while I sleep with cpap therapy. This involves wearing a mask that is connected by a 6’ section of tubing to a cpap machine. While I sleep this machine delivers a continuous amount of specified pressure that keeps my airway open, assures a constant flow of oxygen to my body and brain and minimizes my sleep apnea symptoms. When I had my sleep study over thirteen years ago, I was apparently experiencing an average of 55 apnea “events”, during which my airway was being blocked and airflow to my heart and brain was either restricted or stopped completely. During these events, my oxygen (O2) level was dropping to 72%. Normal sleep is defined by not having more than five events per hour and your oxygen saturation should never drop below 90%. On cpap therapy, my “events” number averages less than ONE event per hour. Unfortunately, without a pulse oximeter attached to the machine, I’m unable to track my O2 levels during the night but I feel confident that this is no longer a problem since my apnea has been minimized. Sure, I will have to sleep with this mask on my face every night for the rest of my life, but I consider this a small price to pay for the way I feel while I’m awake.
I could go on and on about sleep, since good, healthy sleep and the treatment of sleep apnea are things that have been my passion since about 2007. I have been a registered sleep technologist for over ten years and worked in a sleep lab for over eight years. During that time, I have been involved with studies of patients aged 5 to 85 and a few younger, and older. While there is so much more I could discuss such as alternatives to cpap therapy, the sleep lab experience, cpap acclimation issues and mask fitting, those are all subjects that I save for another time and perhaps a different forum. Sleep well and awaken refreshed.