Sleep apnea (disrupted breathing during sleep) is linked to snoring, and is caused by poor tone in the upper throat muscles and a fat-laden tongue, which collapses during sleep, blocking the windpipe. The lack of oxygen alerts the brain, the disturbed sleeper breathes, goes back to sleep and the process repeats itself.
Symptoms
Cures
Naturopathy
Measures include a whole-food diet and appropriate exercise to help shed excess fat. Special exercises might be designed to improve the tone of the mouth and throat muscles. Fresh air, or an ionizer to improve air quality, might be useful. One patent natural remedy comprises a throat spray containing a mixture of five oils - olive, sunflower, peppermint, almond and sesame, with supplementary vitamins B6, C and E.
Vitamins and Minerals
Avoid alcohol consumption last thing at night, and altogether if you need to lose weight. Avoid rich, heavy meals that either interfere with sleep or make you sleep more heavily. Eat plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables to supply vitamin C and bioflavonoids; avocados, bananas, brewer's yeast, rice and salmon to supply vitamin B6 (pyridoxine); and wheat germ, whole meal flour, hazelnuts, walnuts and sunflower seeds and their oils for their vitamin E content.
Specific dietary supplements include B-complex vitamins, vitamin C with vitamin E, calcium, bioflavonoids and magnesium.
Herbal Medicine
Extracts of almond, sesame and olive have been used to reduce severe sleep apnea. Decongestant treatments can also help where allergy or infection is a problem.
Aromatherapy
Remedies are as for sinusitis and hay fever.
The severity of sleep apnea tends to increase as the night (or hours asleep) progresses. Remedies tackling this aspect include Arnica, Arsenicum, Bryonia, Opium and Pulsatilla - take strength of 6c at half-hourly intervals for an hour and a half before retiring, for up to a fortnight. The consequences of a night's sleep continually disturbed by sleep apnea include a dull, thudding headache, drowsiness and mild depression. These remedies should be helpful: take 1 hour before bedtime for 10 consecutive nights, and repeat the dose if you are woken by a nightmare or if you wake and cannot fall asleep again: Aurum 30c for severe depression after dreams of hunger, dying or problems at work; and Gelsemium 6c for a person whose head feels full and swollen, when the face is purple and looks congested, and the facial expression is dull and heavy, when the limbs are weak and shaky, and the pupils seem to be slightly dilated.
Medical Treatment
Surgery to the palate is sometimes resorted to in the case of patients at a severe risk of heart attack or stroke. Medical advice generally is to lose excess weight (sleep apnea is relatively rare in people of normal or sub-normal weight), and perhaps to see an ear, nose and throat consultant with a view to identifying causes such as adenoids or chronic sinusitis.
Prevention
Caution
Additional resources:
I only have sleep apnea if I sleep on my back... so as long as I stay on my side I'm okay. Great article.
so nice post want to see you with new post........
thank you sleep apnea this was part of a big series already published here
Ok, thanks for great work.
good article, as you know I wrote a complete series on sleep disorders