Sleep apnea – Symptoms and causes

Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder in which a person’s breathing is abnormally reduced as they sleep. Disruptions in sleep quality can lead to significant health implications if left unchecked.

Sleep apnea is a prevalent illness, but many people aren’t aware of their nocturnal symptoms, making it challenging to get diagnosed. To comprehend and limit the health consequences of sleep apnea, it is essential to learn about the wide variety of this problem.

What Is Sleep Apnea?

There are several types of sleep-related breathing problems, which are characterized by irregular breathing patterns during sleep. Sleep apnea is one of them.

While they are asleep, those who have sleep apnea frequently experience short pauses in breathing. Sleepers can stay oblivious of their aberrant nighttime breathing even though these lapses lead them to often wake up and disrupt sleep.

Many different causes of breathing problems can lead to sleep apnea, which can be broken down into several different categories.

1. Obstructive Sleep Apnea

OSA develops when the throat’s airway is constricted or closed during sleep, causing snoring. In response to airway obstruction, a person awakens, contracts their throat muscles, and takes multiple gasps or deep breaths, typically followed by snorting or choking.

Most people have obstructive sleep apnea. It affects 10-30% of U.S. adults yet is often untreated.

2. Central Sleep Apnea

CSA disrupts brain-breathing muscle connection. This causes shallow breathing and occasional pauses. Under 1% of persons have CSA. Central sleep apnea is less common than OSA.

Symptoms of Central Sleep Apnea

Most of the time, central sleep apnea is marked by the following symptoms:

1. Breathing patterns that aren’t normal, like living that slows down, speeds up, or stops while sleeping
2. Excessive daytime sleepiness
3. Nighttime awakenings
4. Having trouble breathing or chest pains all of a sudden at night
5. Hard to concentrate
6. Headaches in the morning

As with obstructive sleep apnea, people with central sleep apnea usually aren’t aware of their irregular breathing while they sleep unless a bed partner or caregiver brings it to their attention.

Causes of sleep apnea

Different things cause obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea to make it hard to breathe.

1. Causes of obstructed sleep apnea

People with obstructive sleep apnea have throat muscles that relax while they sleep. This makes it hard for air to get through. Snoring happens when the airway gets smaller, and when the airway gets blocked, the person doesn’t get enough oxygen. Lack of oxygen makes people wake up partially or fully to get air flowing again. During sleep, these breathing problems happen often.

2. The cause of central sleep apnea happens.

Central sleep apnea happens when there are problems with how the brain talks to the muscles that help you breathe. During sleep, a part of the brain called the brain stem doesn’t work right in people with CSA. This means that the brain stem doesn’t know how much carbon dioxide is in the body. This makes you breathe slower and shallower than you should, more than you should.
If you frequently have any of these symptoms, you should discuss them with your primary care physician. If your Gallatin dentist at Sumner Dental Group has any reason to suspect that you suffer from sleep apnea, they will send you to get tested.