It’s Not Just Your Sleep — It’s Your Life!
Don’t Let Obstructive Sleep Apnea Ruin Your Health
If trying to get a good night’s
sleep is keeping you up at night
— or making it hard to stay
awake during the day — The
Sleep Center at Cookeville Regional
can help. The Sleep Center
diagnoses and treats all kinds
of sleep disorders, including insomnia,
sleep apnea, restless legs
syndrome and narcolepsy.
One of the most frequent
problems seen by Sleep Center
staff is obstructive sleep apnea
(OSA), a condition in which
the tissues of the patient’s sinuses,
tongue, neck and/or throat
fall backward to block the airway
during sleep.
The most obvious symptom
of OSA is loud snoring, sometimes
with noticeable pauses
in breathing, but if it’s severe
enough or goes on for long
enough, it can cause life-threatening
problems such as high
blood pressure, strokes, heart
attacks or deadly heart arrhythmias.
Fatigue, excessive daytime
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sleepiness and memory problems
are other less severe but
still life-altering symptoms of
OSA.
“Obstructive apnea is basically
just strangulation or suffocation,”
said Dr. James Davis,
a sleep specialist at The Sleep
Center. “I say that not to shock
people, but to explain why it
can put so much stress on a person’s
body, because people are
fighting for air all night long
while being totally unconscious
of it, except for the way they feel
the next day.”
Mona Lisa Owens of
Cookeville suspected OSA and
started encouraging her husband,
John, to go to The Sleep
Center when his snoring became
so loud that she started
sleeping in another room.
“She was on to me for six
months to a year to go, and finally
I said, ‘Okay, but if I go,
you’re going,’ because I’ve actually
laid there and listened to
her stop breathing while she was
sleeping,” said John.
Both Mona Lisa and John
agreed to go together, and they
were each scheduled for a sleep
study called a polysomnogram.
For this test, several leads are
attached to the patient’s head,
face, legs, chest and abdomen
to monitor brain activity, body
and eye movements, heart rate
and blood pressure to determine
what kind of sleep disorder the
Healthy Living | Fall Issue | 2017 3