When we live alone there are things that we feel more comfortable doing because they don’t bother anyone, such as burping, passing gas and snoring. But snoring, unlike the other two, can represent a problem even for those who live alone, especially when the snoring results from sleep apnea. Sleep apnea is a chronic medical condition that occurs when a person stops breathing or takes shallow breaths one or more times as they sleep. The pauses in breathing may be as short as a few seconds or as long as minutes, with the breathing interruptions usually occurring between 5 and 30 plus times per hour. The condition commonly disturbs a person’s sleep between three and five times each week.

Just because a person snores doesn’t mean that they have apnea, but chronic snorers are wise to contact their physician or a sleep specialist to be tested for the condition.

Obstructive sleep apnea is the most common form of apnea. It occurs when an airway is partially or totally blocked, causing shallow breaths or a cessation in breathing. Then, as the body’s need for oxygen strengthens the autonomic breathing response, air pushes past the obstruction, producing an unusually loud snoring sound and causing the person to move from deep sleep to light sleep. Given the fact that the breathing disturbances usually occur multiple times per hour throughout the night, the person fails to achieve prolonged deep sleep, leaving them feeling tired the next day.

Many apnea suffers seek treatment only after their bed partners have commented at length on their snoring. But if you live alone, that’s not going to happen. Therefore, if you know that you snore and you wake up feeling tired even after you feel that you slept the night through, it’s wise to consult with a sleep medicine clinic. Left unchecked, apnea can place a person at risk for high blood pressure, heart failure, stroke, hypertension, heart attack, irregular heartbeats, obesity and other serious health conditions. And like all long term sleep problems, apnea weakens a person’s immune system. Insufficient sleep decreases the effectiveness of immune cells, compromising their ability to fight off infections.

There are several effective treatments for obstructive apnea, including positive airway pressure therapy, which consists of a nasal or facial mask that maintains an open upper airway; medical therapies consisting of various medications; oral appliance therapy, which provides a mouth device that trains the lower jaw to a hold a position the helps resolve apnea; positioning and weight loss therapies that resolve apnea by weight loss or head positioning during asleep; and occasionally surgical therapy.

Most of the therapies require some dedication on the part of the patient, but patient testimonials reveal the ability to acclimate to the therapies and, ultimately, to the therapies’ great success. While the snoring aspect of sleep apnea might not seem like much of a problem if you live alone, resolving your apnea will prevent you from possibly experiencing a bevy of health related problems down the road.

Sleep is the main function of the body to rejuvenate itself. At night our bodies let us know when we are tired, and need rest. Sleep is far more than rest though. Everyone does it and most of us know from experience that if we don’t get enough sleep we feel horrible, and uneasy like we are fighting our bodies in order to stay awake.

There is no set rules or guidelines for how much sleep each person needs. Some people might require nine hours of sleep to feel refreshed in the morning. While others may only need 5 hours to achieve the same feeling in the morning. Having a certain pattern of sleep is key to feeling well rested. Within each 24 hour span we should let our bodies rest.

There can be times where we do not get enough sleep, and cannot make up for lost sleep. The best thing to do in this situation is if you have been missing out on your usual sleep pattern that usually works, then try to get back into that pattern. The human body can survive with four to five hours of sleep a night.

There are different kinds of sleepers to match each kind of sleep. There are rough sleepers, light sleepers, and deep sleepers. Rough sleepers are the type that roll and toss around all night in bed. Light sleepers such as me are the kind of sleeper that never get into the REM sleep that is necessary for resting our bodies. Deep sleepers on the other hand tend to fall into a deep sleep that is sometimes hard to wake them from and they barely move during sleep.

In the hectic world we all live in today, it’s interesting to see that people are starting to think of sleep as a hobby. They get as much sleep as they can get, and there is nothing they enjoy more than getting comfy in some blankets for a night of sleeping or a quick nap during the day.

Whatever kind of sleeper you are, there’s no doubt that sleep plays an important part in our lives. We spend about a third of our lives asleep. That might seem like a lot of time when you look at the big picture, but for most people with busy schedules, it’s hard to think that we are able to sleep that much during our lives.

Sleep apnea study reveals that it is a very common sleeping disease in which a person stops breathing for a minimum of 10 seconds during the sleep. This is generally caused by a constrained airway transition in the throat. But at times sleep apnea may be the result of excessive weight gain. The restriction of the airway in the throat may result in discontinuing the heart beat of the person for few seconds. This makes the individual pant for oxygen and awakes him in panic.

There are three kinds of apnea sleep disorders - complex, central and obstructive. The most common is the obstructive form and the rarest is the central form of apnea.

The main problem about this disease, as per the sleep apnea study, is that the patient is completely unaware of the happenings in the body. The individual will only understand some kind of problem when he or she wakes up in panic and then resume breathing. Apart from this there are other symptoms that can help one detect this illness

? Loud Snoring

? Sleepiness the succeeding day

? Repetitive silences due to apnea

? Sudden Awakenings to restart breathing

? Worn out after a night’s sleep

? Gasping to get air into the lungs while sleeping

This disease is like a nuisance for the person suffering from it. Sleep apnea has a very bad affect on physical as well as mental health of the person. The individual lives in a constant danger of hurting him or herself. In severe cases there is every possibility of sleep apnea death. This is why you need to get in touch with a doctor as soon as you are aware of the persisting sleep disorder.

When you consult a doctor, he will send you for sleep study program or sleep apnea study or polysomnogram or polysomnography. This test is performed during the night at the sleep study center. All the symptoms of the apnea disorder are monitored by a nurse or an observer with the help of various medical equipments.

Sleep apnea study is a comfortable process for few but for others the electrodes placed on the face and other parts of the body can be a cause of discomfort. These equipment can cause irritation on the sensitive skins of patients.

The key area that is looked upon during the polysomnogram test is respiration. The device used in this process helps to check the continuous transition of the airflow by monitoring the temperature change in the mouth. The sensitive device shows indications when the person stops breathing.

Apart from this the things that are examined are brain activity that detects the phase of sleep the person is in. Detection of the muscle tone is another way to confirm the stage of sleep.

The eye movement detection in the sleep apnea study helps to analyze the quality of sleep that the person is having. This study also looks for evidence of having restless condition of legs, measures changes in oxygen level with a pulse oximeter - a small clip worn on the finger of the patient.