Can Adjustable Beds Help Your Sleep Apnea?

Sleep apnea is a condition that occurs when a person is asleep, and it is caused by an obstruction to the air passageways of the nose, throat, and chest. The most common side effect of sleep apnea is snoring. This occurs when the air passageways become restricted to the point that even shallow inhalations and exhalations cause them to vibrate. Sleep apnea may be frightening because it is something that occurs while unconscious, and it is thus uncontrollable. The best way to prevent sleep apnea is to sleep in a position that helps the respiratory system function with ease. For this reason, physicians recommend sleeping upright to remove pressure from the chest and enable easy breathing throughout the night.

It is recommended that those with sleep apnea use a device to help them sleep in a semi-upright position to enable proper breathing throughout the night. For years, physicians typically recommended that individuals use pillows to prop themselves up in bed. This presents a problem for most sleepers, however, because pillows tend to deflate or shift during the night. As a result, a semi-upright position is nearly impossible to maintain through the night. The sleeper returns to a nearly flat position before long, causing the air passageways to become restricted and the side effects of sleep apnea to take hold.

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Adjustable beds will be very helpful for individuals who suffer with sleep apnea. Adjustable beds allow the head to be elevated. This prevents the tongue from falling back and blocking the airway. Once this situation is prevented, the person's sleep will no longer be interrupted. Adjustable beds naturally readjust the airway so that the sufferer will start having a good night's sleep.

Can Adjustable Beds Help Your Sleep Apnea?

Those who are overweight also suffer from this sleeping disorder. Due to their weight, the body is more prone to narrowing of airway and painful pressure points in the body. An overweight person's neck suffers as well. When there is much fat around the neck, the tissues causes the narrowing of airways. This is the reason why overweight people snores loudly at night. Even though the person is still overweight, adjustable beds can help. These beds support the body in a comfortable position in which the tongue will no longer fall back and cause breathing interruptions.

The most important thing one gets with an adjustable bed is the ability to sleep in a fixed angle throughout the night. This redistributes body weight across the body, relieving the upper torso from the pressure that typically causes sleep apnea. Sleeping in a semi-upright position also helps to prevent acid reflux and other GERD symptoms from forming. These new beds may also be used with a memory foam mattress to provide superior support for the hips, lower back, and shoulders. Such added support is ideal for individuals who suffer with arthritis pains as well. Sleeping in an upright and fully supported position relieves joints of the tension that causes morning stiffness, muscle tension, and arthritic pain.

Getting complete rest is essential to be energetic, revitalized, and productive the next day. Adjustable beds are a great investment for you to make sure that you will have complete rest. With an adjustable electric bed, all adjustments can be done using a remote control. With the different models of adjustable beds, you can pick portable, lighter or wall hugging ones to save space. There are also adjustable beds that come with massages to relax the body after a very tiring day.

Can Adjustable Beds Help Your Sleep Apnea?

Medical benefits of adjustable beds include relief from sleep apnea, acid reflux, arthritic pain, and muscle tension. Readers are encouraged to read more about how adjustable beds reduce the incidence of body pains, GERD symptoms, and sleep apnea.

The Link Between Sleep Apnea, Anxiety, and Depression

Obstructive sleep apnea has been identified as a serious medical sleep disorder affecting millions of Americans, often without their knowledge. These individuals awake each morning tired, achy, depressed, and confused about why they can't seem to get a good night's sleep, in spite of going to bed early. They overreact, lose their temper, cry more frequently, and can become irrational.

The word apnea translates to "without breath". Individuals with sleep apnea tend to lose their ability to breathe as they sleep, due to a collapsing airway. This sleep disorder means the individual must wake up momentarily after going without oxygen for too long. When this happens minute by minute, hour by hour, night after night, the effects can be devastating, both mentally and physically. The problem is not the number of hours of sleep they get each night. The problem is the number of times they wake up each night to start breathing again.

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Sleep Deprivation Leads To Psychotic Episodes

The Link Between Sleep Apnea, Anxiety, and Depression

Sleep deprivation, as any new parent can tell you, can be a highly destructive and tortuous situation. Being woken up again and again throughout the night makes it impossible for your mind or your body to get the rest needed to function properly. To complicate matters even more, the brains of sleep deprived individuals end up with an over stimulated amygdala, which shuts down the prefrontal cortex. The prefrontal cortex is the center for logical reasoning and the source of calming chemicals. The amygdala, on the other hand, is the Lizard Brain that initiates the "fight or flight" response.

To prepare for perceived conflicts, the amygdala releases chemicals that increase heart rate, glucose levels, and blood pressure. Being constantly "on alert" drains the mental and physical resources of the person suffering form sleep apnea. In contrast, individuals who are able to sleep through the night, both due to healthy airways or the use of CPAP machines or BIPAP machines, are able to think rationally, awake rested, and control their emotions.

Loss Of Sleep Means Loss Of Control

Sleep apnea frequently results in emotional problems such as depression and anxiety. While this sleep disorder is easily resolved with CPAP machines or BIPAP machines, many sufferers ignore their symptoms until they become unbearable, often resulting in difficulties at work, failed relationships, and debilitating depression.

Compromised thought processes resulting from sleep apnea make individuals with this sleep disorder lose their ability to think rationally or to control their emotions. Instead of losing your spouse, your career, or your good health to this treatable sleep disorder, a simple visit to your doctor's office can start you on the path to better health and clearer thinking.

CPAP Machines And BIPAP Machines

CPAP machines and BIPAP machines provide nearly instant relief from the negative effects of sleep apnea by correcting this sleep disorder. CPAP machines deliver air through a CPAP mask, worn as you sleep. While it does take a few nights to get used to, the results are astounding and immediate. BIPAP machines operate in a similar fashion but they provide a higher pressure inhalation and a lower pressure exhalation. Your doctor can tell you which system will help you to get the good night's sleep your mind and body so desperately need.

The Link Between Sleep Apnea, Anxiety, and Depression

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What's the Difference Between Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Central Sleep Apnea?

We usually hear sleep apnea being talked about as a condition that's signified by loud, chronic snoring. But that's not always the case. When a person suffers from obstructive apnea, they snore as air pushes past a totally or partially blocked airway, with the breathing interruptions happening at least 5 and sometimes in excess of 30 times an hour. If you share your bed with someone who hasn't resolved his or her obstructive apnea, you know how annoying this can be. Not only do the breathing interruptions result in your partner's moving from a state of deep sleep to light sleep, but they can have the same effect on you, leaving both of you feeling tired, irritable and unable to concentrate during waking hours.

However, if your partner suffers from central apnea, you may not be aware that he or she is experiencing sleep apnea. Unlike obstructive apnea that results from a block airway, central apnea is caused by the brain's ineffectively communicating the correct breathing actions to the breathing muscles. Consequently, the sufferer intermittently gasps for air instead of snoring. Central apnea is less common that obstructive apnea, but it's no less dangerous to a person's long-term health. Both obstructive and central apnea can increase a person's risk for a myriad of negative health conditions, including high blood pressure, hypertension, heart failure, diabetes, erectile dysfunction, obesity, depression and poor concentration. But the most damaging effect of sleep apnea is its weakening of the immune system. As with all sleep problems, the insufficient sleep that results form apnea causes immune cells to function with less efficiency and therefore decreases the body's ability to fight off infection and disease.

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So, what's the best way to determine the presence of apnea and then resolve it? The first step is to make an appointment with your general physician or schedule a consultation with a sleep medicine clinic. Your physician may be able to conclude that you suffer from apnea upon conducting a physical investigation, especially considering that enlarged tonsils and obesity commonly result in obstructive apnea. But when apnea is suspected and its cause isn't immediately obvious, receiving a polysomnogram from a sleep clinic is the best way to determine the cause of apnea, especially in the case of central apnea.

What's the Difference Between Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Central Sleep Apnea?

A polysomnogram is a non-invasive procedure that uses sensors to monitor a person's brain functions and physical movements as they sleep. After the test reveals the nature and the cause of the apnea, the correct course of treatment in determined. Apnea treatments range from sleep masks that prevent the closing of airways to prescription medication to surgical procedures, with surgery being the least common treatment.

Whatever course of apnea treatment your physician recommends, it's important that you or your partner receive the treatment as soon as possible. If surgery is recommended and you begin to feel that the sleep disturbances and daytime tiredness are preferable to undergoing an operation, remember that untreated apnea predisposes you serious medical conditions that are also likely to require surgery.

What's the Difference Between Obstructive Sleep Apnea and Central Sleep Apnea?

Snoring is the most common sign of obstructive sleep apnea. But just because you don't snore doesn't mean that you don't have sleep apnea. Central sleep apnea usually occurs without snoring but is equally dangerous. For help with apnea and other sleep problems, contact your physician or a sleep clinic. Visit FusionSleep.com for more information and get a good nights rest.