Common Surgeries On Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea is a rather common yet often undiagnosed condition wherein there are instances of shallow or infrequent breathing during sleep. This condition causes a trouble in your sleep, resulting in fatigue or even drowsiness during the day.

Managing Sleep Apnea

There are two primary goals of treating sleep apnea. The first is to bring back regular inhaling and exhaling during sleep, and the second is to avoid loud snoring (a common symptom of the disorder) and daytime sleepiness.

Exactly how Sleep Apnea Can Be Handled

Lifestyle Change

If you have a mild case of sleep apnea, a life-style change may be all that you will need to treat this problem.

Some of the lifestyle adjustments you can make include:

Staying away from alcohol and the intake of sleeping tablets
Stopping the nasty habit of cigarette smoking
Losing weight
Sleeping on your side instead of on your back as the latter can make it harder for your throat to stay open while you sleep

Mouthpieces

A mouthpiece, also known as an oral appliance, is another remedy for a mild case of sleep apnea. Doctors would also suggest you wear a mouthpiece if you snore loudly even if you dont have sleep apnea.

In the therapy of sleep apnea, you will be wearing a Custom-fit plastic mouthpiece that is specially designed to adjust your tongue and lower jaw to keep your breathing passages open while youre sleeping.

Continuous Positive Airway Pressure or CPAP

This sort of remedy arrives with the use of CPAP masks. The mask is used over the mouth or nose while you sleep. It is connected to a machine that supplies a steady flow of oxygen, which passes from the device to the mask through a tube.

CPAP is the one sleep apnea treatment that is most suggested by physicians.

Surgery

The more invasive alternative of surgery for sleep apnea is performed on patients with a deviated septum, smaller lower jaw with an overbite, or enlarged tonsils that narrow the inhaling and exhaling passages.

Surgery to correct the causes of sleep apnea involves shrinking, stiffening, or removing excess tissue, or resetting the lower jaw to widen air passages.

The three most common surgeries performed on sleep apnea patients are the following:

Nasal Surgery to correct a deviated septum
Mandibular maxillar advancement surgery to remove throat obstructions
Uvulopalatopharyngoplasty to remove extra tissue on the back of the palate and throat

Treatment of Sleep Apnea

When talking of sleeping difficulties, many people instantly think of sleeping disorders. There is another sleeping disorder just as common but often goes undiagnosed called sleep apnea.

What exactly is Sleep Apnea?

Sleep apnea is a common disorder where you have shallow breaths or breathing pauses that can last from a few seconds up to a couple of short minutes while sleeping. A collapsed or obstructed airway and enlarged tonsils are the primary factors behind this condition.

Although normal breathing usually starts again after these pauses, sleep is normally disrupted as they can occur up to 30 times an hour. When your breathing gets short or pauses, you are taken out of a deep sleep and into light sleep.

This results in disrupted sleeping patterns and can in turn make you tired and tired during the day.

Because the signs and symptoms of sleep apnea only happen while asleep, most people who have it don't know that they do. Routine visits to the doctor or lab tests can't help diagnose this problem. It is only when a roommate or family member notices the signs when sleep apnea is diagnosed.

Sleep Apnea When Left Untreated

When undiagnosed or left untreated, sleep apnea can raise the dangers of the following conditions:

Heart failure
Arrhythmias
High blood pressure
Stroke
Obesity
Diabetes

Untreated sleep apnea can also increase the chance of having driving or work-related accidents.

Treatment of Sleep Apnea

This sleeping problem requires long-term management. Among the best remedies of sleep apnea is CPAP, or continuous positive airway pressure.

CPAP uses mild air pressure to keep the collapsed airway open and allow air to flow freely while you sleep. This type of treatment involves the use of a machine, aptly called the CPAP machine, which has 3 main parts:

The mask that is placed over your nose or mouth. The mask comes with straps to hold it in place when being worn.
A tube that connects the mask to the CPAP machine's motor.
A motor that blows air into your nose or mouth via the tube.

CPAP machines are commonly lightweight, compact, and fairly quiet. The noise they produce is usually soft and rhythmic to induce sleep.

Apart from the consistent utilization of a CPAP device, changes in lifestyle, mouthpieces, or surgery can effectively treat sleep apnea in many people.