If you are overweight, losing weight can have an enormous impact. While it is usually not a total cure, it can reduce the number of breathing episodes you experience, reduce your blood pressure, and decrease daytime sleepiness. Even a small amount of weight loss can open up your throat and improve sleep apnea symptoms.
Even when exercise does not lead to weight loss, it can decrease your sleep apnea breathing episodes and improve your alertness and energy during the day.
Aerobic exercise, resistance training, and yoga are all good choices for strengthening the muscles in your airways and improving breathing. Sleep on your side. Lying on your back is the worst position for sleep apnea, as it causes the jaw, tongue, and other soft tissues to drop back toward the throat, narrowing your airway. Lying on your side, on the other hand, helps keep your airway open. Avoid alcohol, anti-anxiety medication, and other sedatives , especially before bedtime, because they relax the muscles in the throat and interfere with breathing.
This includes benzodiazepines e. Xanax, Valium, Klonopin, Ativan , antihistamines e. Benadryl, Claritin , opiates e. Prop your head up. Elevate the head of your bed by four to six inches, or elevate your body from the waist up by using a foam wedge or special cervical pillow.
Open your nasal passages at night by using a nasal dilator, saline spray, breathing strips, or a nasal irrigation system neti pot. Quit smoking. Smoking contributes to sleep apnea by increasing inflammation and fluid retention in your throat and upper airway. In addition to lifestyle changes, most people with sleep apnea will need to seek treatment that helps keep the airway open during sleep. Currently, the most effective treatment for mild to severe sleep apnea is continuous positive airflow pressure — or CPAP — therapy.
A CPAP device is a machine that uses a hose and airtight nosepiece or mask to deliver a steady stream of air as you sleep. The air pressure helps keep your airway open, preventing pauses in breathing.
CPAP technology is constantly being updated and improved, and the new CPAP devices are lighter, quieter, and more comfortable than they used to be. It can take some time to get accustomed to sleeping while wearing a CPAP device.
When it comes to CPAP therapy, one size does not fit all. There are many different types of masks available, including ones that cover the full face and ones that cover only the nose. Masks also come in a range of sizes, to accommodate different face shapes. There are also options that allow you to sleep in any position, accommodate glasses, and stay on if you toss and turn. Be sure to discuss your options with your doctor and schedule follow-up appointments to check the fit, evaluate your treatment progress, and adjust or switch your mask if necessary.
Ease into it. Having obstructive sleep apnea increases your risk of high blood pressure hypertension. Obstructive sleep apnea might also increase your risk of recurrent heart attack, stroke and abnormal heartbeats, such as atrial fibrillation. If you have heart disease, multiple episodes of low blood oxygen hypoxia or hypoxemia can lead to sudden death from an irregular heartbeat.
Complications with medications and surgery. Obstructive sleep apnea is also a concern with certain medications and general anesthesia. People with sleep apnea might be more likely to have complications after major surgery because they're prone to breathing problems, especially when sedated and lying on their backs. Our patients tell us that the quality of their interactions, our attention to detail and the efficiency of their visits mean health care like they've never experienced.
See the stories of satisfied Mayo Clinic patients. Before coming to Mayo Clinic, Tammy Olson had been told the severe obstructive sleep apnea she'd been living with for years was beyond treatment.
After meeting Christopher Viozzi, M. Tammy Olson was at the end of her rope [ Mayo Clinic does not endorse companies or products. Advertising revenue supports our not-for-profit mission. This content does not have an English version. This content does not have an Arabic version. Overview Sleep apnea is a potentially serious sleep disorder in which breathing repeatedly stops and starts.
The main types of sleep apnea are: Obstructive sleep apnea, the more common form that occurs when throat muscles relax Central sleep apnea, which occurs when your brain doesn't send proper signals to the muscles that control breathing Complex sleep apnea syndrome, also known as treatment-emergent central sleep apnea, which occurs when someone has both obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea.
Request an Appointment at Mayo Clinic. Obstructive sleep apnea Open pop-up dialog box Close. Treatment of central sleep apnea typically means addressing the medical problems that are causing the apnea in the first place — for instance, treating heart problems may improve central sleep apnea symptoms. Reducing the dose of medication can sometimes be helpful, and positive pressure ventilation can be helpful, too, using either CPAP or another type of ventilator, called bilevel positive airway pressure BiPAP , according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.
Doctors have more recently identified a third type of sleep apnea called complex sleep apnea, which is a combination of obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea.
Since CPAP is usually quite effective in treating obstructive sleep apnea, its failure to alleviate symptoms would suggest the patient had central sleep apnea. The problem is that there is still a lot of debate among sleep medicine specialists about what exactly is going on in complex sleep apnea, or what the key characteristics that define it are. In a study published in the journal Sleep Medicine Clinics , doctors conducted a review of patients referred to the Mayo Clinic Sleep Disorders Center over one month, as well as 20 patients diagnosed with central sleep apnea.
They found that 15 percent of all sleep apnea patients had complex sleep apnea. As many as 84 percent were found to have obstructive sleep apnea, and 0. Editorial Sources and Fact-Checking. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine. June Watson NF. August National Sleep Foundation. Obstructive Sleep Apnea. American Academy of Sleep Medicine. My AHI is usually around 0—1.
Why did it jump up to 4 when I just took a short nap? Why is my AHI higher than zero?
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