Sleep Apnea

What is sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder in which your breathing stops or gets shallow temporarily. These pauses in your breathing can occur dozens of times each hour while you sleep.

Causes, incidence, and risk factors

More than 100 different diorder of sleeping and waking have been identified. They can be grouped in four main categories:
Problems with falling and staying asleep
Problems with staying awake
Problems with adhering to a regular sleep schedule

Sleep-disruptive behaviors

PROBLEMS WITH FALLING AND STAYING ASLEEP

Insomenia includes any combination of difficulty with falling asleep, staying asleep, intermittent
Wakefulness and early-morning awakening. Episodes may be transient (come and go), short-term (lasting as long as 2 to 3 weeks), or chronic (long-lasting).
Common factors associated with insomnia include:
Physical illness
Depression
stress
Poor sleeping environment such as excessive noise or light
Caffeine
Alcohol or other drugs
Use of certain medications
Heavy smoking
Physical discomfort
Daytime napping
Counterproductive sleep habits:

Early bedtimes
Excessive time spent awake in bed

Disorders include:

Psychophysiological insomnia (learned insomnia)
Delayed sleep phase syndrome -- where a patient's internal clock is constantly out of synch with the "accepted" day / night phases; for example, patients feel best if they can sleep from 4AM to noon
Hypnotic-dependent sleep disorder -- insomnia resulting from building tolerance to, or stopping, certain types of sleep medications
Stimulant-dependent sleep disorder -- insomnia resulting depending on, or stopping, certain types of stimulants

PROBLEMS WITH STAYING AWAKE

Disorders of ExcessiveSleepiness are called hypersomnias. These include:
Sleep apnea
Narcolepsy
Restless leg syndrome
Periodic limb movement disorder
Obstructive sleep apnea
Central sleep apnea
Ideopathic hypersomnia

Respiratory muscle weakness associated sleep disorder
Sleep apnea more commonly affects obese people, but it may affect anyone with a short neck or a small jaw, regardless of weight. The disorder causes breathing to stop intermittently during sleep, resulting in the person being awakened repeatedly. People with sleep apnea often have difficulty achieving prolonged deep sleep. This results in excessive daytime sleepiness.