What happens if you don’t sleep well? What are the eventual health concerns? Missing out on the recommended seven to nine hours of shut-eye does more than just make you feel tired and groggy. The long-term effects of sleep deprivation can not only drain your mental abilities, but put your physical health at real risk. Without enough sleep, your brain and body systems can’t function normally, and will dramatically lower your quality of life overtime.
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Snoring
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Excessive Daytime Sleepiness
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Hypertension (High Blood Pressure)
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Strokes or Brain Damage
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Heart Attacks
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Acid Reflux (GERD - Gastro-esophageal Reflux Disease)
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Morning Headaches
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Diabetes
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Sexual Dysfunction
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Social Problems
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And More
Basic Info about Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA)
- Untreated sleep apnea can take 10 years off of your life! Compare this to diabetes and smoking, which shorten life span 5-7 years.
- In hospitals, if a patient’s oxygen levels drop below 92% they are placed on oxygen. Compare this to sleep apnea patients, who can experience oxygen level drops to as low as 50%.
- If you hold your breath for 3 minutes, you could not lower your oxygen level below 95%.
- The decibel level reached by a loud snorer is over the threshold for requiring hearing protection by OSHA in many industrial workplaces (up to 90 db). A loud snorer makes more noise than a crying baby, a motorcycle, and a jackhammer. Why is snoring a symptom? The pathology behind snoring and obstructive sleep apnea is the same: a narrow, collapsible, airway!
- Snoring noise is caused by passing air through a small hole, the tissues vibrate making the ‘snoring’ sound.
- Someone who ‘just snores,’ who gains a few pounds or has a few alcoholic drinks, could become someone with apnea.
Impact of Excessive Sleepiness
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Lack of energy and fatigue: OSA patients spend significant amounts of time at night in a ‘fight or flight’ state with elevated blood pressure, heart rate, and respiration. People do not feel rested in the morning because they spent the night fighting to breathe.
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Increased likelihood of vehicle accidents: OSA patients are twelve times more likely to be involved in an automobile accident. Tired driving is the number one cause of car accidents and is statistically more dangerous than drunk driving. Sleeping less than 4 hours per night is equivalent to being legally intoxicated with alcohol.
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High blood pressure: Every time an apnea or hypopnea occurs, your heart rate and blood pressure increase. OSA patients have hundreds of events per night, thus the body remains in a constant state of elevated blood pressure. Because the body is not getting sufficient oxygen, it is not converting enough into nitric oxide. As a result, OSA increases hypertension risk by 45% and is responsible for 80% of nocturnal strokes.
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Mood changes: Patients who struggle with OSA tend to have greater social implications due to drastic changes in their mood, irritability, lack of energy, and more.
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GERD: When breathing is stopped, the body increases efforts to take in air. Abdominal contractions are exaggerated, and get worse if breathing does not begin. These contractions squeeze the stomach and force acid up. Negative pressure builds up in the esophagus because of efforts to breathe. This helps pull acid up as well.
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Headaches: Headaches have been linked to the presence of OSA! Besides trigeminal nerve and TMJoint involvement, headaches have been linked to oxygen desaturation events. Migraine headaches are correlated with REM & Delta sleep patterns which are severely disrupted in patients with OSA.
Lack of sleep can take a drastic toll on your overall health. To learn more about snoring and sleep apnea concerns, contact us today! Solve your pain in 6-8 months or we’ll give you your money back.