Sleep Apnea Treatment
Sleep apnea is a serious condition, but effective treatment can help.
Many different problems, including breathing issues and heart disease, can cause sleep apnea. Sometimes, it’s even caused by something as simple as allergies or sinus congestion. While many treatments are available for sleep apnea, the most effective one depends on your diagnosis and how severe it is.
How is sleep apnea treated?
You have several treatment options, including lifestyle changes, oral appliances, CPAP therapy, and surgical options. At Sleep Matters, we can help you choose the right option for you.
If you’re overweight or obese, losing weight may help reduce sleep apnea symptoms.
If you smoke cigarettes, quitting smoking can improve sleep apnea symptoms as well as reduce the risk of heart disease and other health problems associated with smoking.
What can I do to reduce my risk of sleep apnea?
Avoid alcohol and sedatives before bed. These substances can relax muscles in the throat, making them more likely to collapse during sleep.
Sleep on your side instead of your back. If you have trouble sleeping on one side or the other, try placing a rolled-up towel underneath one shoulder while sleeping to prop it up higher than the other shoulder (this helps keep airways open).
Don’t sleep with a pillow that is too high or too low; use several pillows to prop your upper body. This will reduce strain on your neck muscles and make it easier for them to stay open, as well as reduce snoring caused by constricted airways in people who do not use a pillow at night time
Is there a cure for sleep apnea?
No, there is no cure for sleep apnea. However, depending on your condition’s severity, treatment options are available. Treatment can include:
Lifestyle changes
Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) therapy,
Oral appliances that help keep your airway open while you sleep,
Surgery to remove fatty tissue from around the throat area or jawbone reconstruction if it’s causing blockages in your airways, and
Surgery to implant a device that will stimulate your tongue forward (similar to a pacemaker).
The type of treatment chosen will depend on how severe your case is. A sleep test will help determine the severity of your apnea.
The test will monitor signals from various parts of your body, such as brain waves and heart rate, taken during various stages throughout one night’s sleep cycle, including REM (rapid eye movement) periods when most dreaming occurs;
non-REM N3 stages where we’re partially awake but still mostly asleep; waking up briefly before returning again later on after going through another cycle throughout each sleep period.
There are many ways you can treat your sleep apnea.
The most common treatments include lifestyle changes, CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure), oral appliances, and surgery. Lifestyle changes include losing weight, quitting smoking, and avoiding alcohol and sedatives.
A CPAP is a machine that blows pressurized air into your nose while you sleep to keep the airways open so it can’t collapse. It’s attached to a mask that fits over your nose and mouth while asleep so that the pressurized air flows through it into your nostrils.
Oral appliances are devices worn in the mouth that position the jaw slightly open and slightly forward during sleep to prevent your tongue and soft tissue from relaxing back over your airway.
Obstructed airway
Oral appliance airway
Here is an image of an actual patient. On the left, you will see what an obstructed airway looks like, and the right shows the airway while wearing an oral appliance.
In some cases, surgery may be recommended as a treatment for sleep apnea. Surgery may be used to:
Remove excess tissue from the airways: If excess tissue, such as the uvula or tonsils, is blocking the airways, surgery may be used to remove the excess tissue and help improve breathing during sleep.
Reposition the jaw or tongue: If the position of the jaw or tongue is causing the airways to be blocked, surgery may be used to reposition these structures and help keep the airways open during sleep.
Implant a device called the Inspire that functions similar to a pacemaker, that stimulates your tongue forward if it relaxes too much.
Surgery may be an option for people with more severe sleep apnea or for those who cannot tolerate other treatment options.