Lake City Community Hospital recently installed the Carolina Sleep Lab, a two-bed sleep lab used to perform tests for sleep disorders.

A health-care specialist can order an overnight sleep study known as a polysomnogram if he or she suspects a patient has a sleep disorder such as sleep apnea, in which breathing repeatedly stops and starts.

In sleep apnea, each episode — called an apnea — can occur hundreds of times during the night and often for a minute or longer. An episode is followed by a sudden attempt to breathe and a lighter stage of sleep. The result is fragmented or interrupted sleep and a drop in the blood oxygen level, according to information provided by Wendell Boatwright of the hospital’s sleep lab.

The multiple-component study in the lab electronically transmits and records specific physical activities while the patient sleeps. If a patient is determined to have a sleep disorder, a sleep specialist determines the appropriate treatment to provide normal ventilation and improve energy and attentiveness during the day, lower blood pressure, and decrease risk of strokes and heart attacks.

Treatments range from prescriptions to positive airway pressure therapy, a noninvasive therapy that uses a mask that provides a gentle flow of air pressure through the nose. The air pressure prevents airway collapse, which allows a patient to breathe freely during sleep.

Mild or occasional sleep apnea may not be important, but chronic, severe, obstructive sleep apnea r(OSA) equires treatment to prevent low blood oxygen levels, sleep deprivation and other complications, the most serious of which is a form of congestive heart failure called cor pulmonale.

Estimates are that more than 18 million people have sleep apnea. A person who has the disorder often is not aware of the apnea episodes during the night; often, family members, especially spouses, witness the periods of apnea.

Risk factors include being male, overweight and over age 40, although sleep apnea affects men, women and children.

The three types of apnea are obstructive, central and mixed. Obstructive is caused by a blockage of the airway, usually when the soft tissue in the rear of the throat collapses and closes during sleep. In central apnea, the brain’s respiratory control centers are imbalanced and the brain fails to signal to the muscles to breathe. Mixed apnea, as the name implies, is a combination of the two.

The inability to breathe properly often results in sudden awakenings throughout the night that prevent a person from feeling refreshed throughout the day.

Other signs of sleep apnea include:

  • Morning headaches
  • Memory difficulties
  • Difficulty concentrating
  • Personality changes
  • Restless and fitful sleep
  • Frequent waking during the night to urinate
  • Excessive daytime sleepiness
  • Snoring
  • Gasping or choking during sleep
  • Grogginess
  • Depression
  • Obesity
  • Large neck or crowding of the upper airway
  • Erectile dysfunction
  • Dry mouth
  • Hyperactive behavior, especially in children
  • Leg swelling (if severe)
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Filed under: Obstructive Sleep Apnea • Polysomnography • Sleep • Sleep Apnea • Sleep Apnea Diagnosis • Sleep Apnea Events • Sleep Apnea News • Sleep Apnea Test • Sleep Center • Sleep Disorders • Sleep Lab • Sleep Study

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