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Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
#21
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
That's because his blinks lasted several minutes.  Cool
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#22
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
(04-21-2018, 09:10 AM)ronlecroy Wrote: Has anyone experienced debilitation or crisis due to sleep deprivation that led to hospitalization?  I'm worried that I may lose consciousness or cognitive ability to the point where I'm in trouble.  I'm seriously exhausted but cannot sleep.  Right now I function by just closing my eyes for 3 minute micro naps during the day.  I have not had trouble driving yet, but that's bound to come either from inability to react quickly or dozing off.

As mentioned in my previous posts I'm stuck in a limbo between ENT, sleep doctor, and urologist (frequent urge to urinate) and none have offered any solutions or seem very concerned.  I have a grunt or hum that wakes me every time I doze off, over and over.  Therefore sleep in cycles lasting minutes until my body eventually gives up and will not sleep.

I'm trying to get sleep study (home or clinic) but my concern is that I never really sleep.  Who knows, I might not even have APNEA.  I don't really sleep for enough time to know.  I never even get to any sort of deep sleep because as I doze off I grunt myself awake.  I'm in the process of buying a auto cpap with out of pocket money.

ronlecroy, I hope you are still monitoring this board and also have obtained some relief. Your description sounds almost exactly like me, moreso than anything I've read here or on another active board. Yes, sleep deprivation can become a crisis. I have been unable to sleep for over four decades. I saw for the first time several months ago some of my hospital records from 2008. Major surgery and in hospital for four days. Nurses very irritated that my pulse ox kept going off but when they came in I was always awake with O2 in mid 90's +. Those were the values - high 90's - they would record. I kept saying I could not breathe. Surgical resident came in and yelled at me for bothering nurses, ordered a RT consult to prove it was my imagination. RT read nurses notes but also pulled electronic records. My O2 was never higher than 84 during my "episodes" and I was having cardiac changes. Nobody told me this, before or after the hospitalization. RT had cpap delivered but whatever the pressure was I could not tolerate it. Fast forward to 2016, semi-retired. I was falling asleep (if it can be called that - apparently I just briefly blanked out) constantly in the presence of other people (so I assume also when I was alone). Family and the few friends I had left didn't say anything because they thought it would be rude! I was exhausted constantly, though that was not new. If I ate anything I would become very groggy for a period of time. Told this to my primary care doctor over a two year period but he said it was just post carbohydrate crashing. Was having many episodes of watching tv or writing a paper when as far as I knew I was still typing, or watching, but then would realize there were no additional words and the tv plot line had nothing to do with the real tv show! One pleasant sunny day I was driving on the interstate and thinking how nice it was to not be in traffic when there was the guardrail, in the middle of the road that I had been enjoying. I was not drowsy or sleepy at all. The road was clear, and then it wasn't. I totaled my car. Thankfully there really was no traffic on the roadway. After two more doctor visits where my complaints of blanking out were ignored, I forcefully told the doctor that I believed I had narcolepsy. Like the surgical resident, he was going to prove to me that I was just loony-bats so he gave me a referral for a sleep evaluation.

Obviously I have SA because I am on this board. More pertinent to why I think you and I share an issue in common that I haven't read in others' posts is you inability to go to sleep within the "normal" time frame. I have never been able to, which contributed to my sleep deprivation, because the world awakens no later than 7:00am, which for me meant 2-3 hours of sleep. I believed it was anxiety and pressure from my job that would keep my mind spinning from 10-11pm to 3-4am. I came to fear going to bed because I couldn't stop worrying and a portion of that worry was that I wouldn't get enough sleep to function the next day!

The first and firm diagnosis my sleep doctor gave based on my EPS testing score was a circadian rhythm sleep disorder, advanced sleep phase. My episodes are micro-sleeps, not narcolepsy. She said it was a good thing I am retired because there isn't much success in treating it so I would be "normal". However, just learning that I had it helped me accept that I no longer had to fear trying to go to sleep like a normal person. I wish I could fit into the waking world better, but at least I no longer worry about it. It really is a good thing I am retired because at least I can sleep later into the morning. Even my sleep study was done during the day instead of night. I still do not get enough hours of good sleep because I am working on the SA aspects, but I am greatly improved. I rarely experience drowsiness after eating. (I could never take naps even though drowsy. Would wake up as soon as I lay down.) I haven't "blanked out" since starting apap. I still have a fear of driving over a half hour, which has been extremely limiting, but I must take an eight-hour drive in the near future. I have to figure out some way of sending alerts to myself every hour or so just to be sure I am awake because I had absolutely no prodromal signs before the guardrail was in front of me.

So, I hope you have been able to get a full evaluation by now, including learning if you may have a rhythm disorder. SA alone can do damage to your body's systems. If you have a rhythm disorder, you can be helped in various ways to cope with it. If SA, you can receive treatment that will improve the quality of your sleep when you are able to get it.
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#23
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
To Greenbean,
Your insistence on driving even after a serious accident is both stupid and criminal. You are worse then a drunk driver. You should turn in your driver's license before you kill someone.
JD
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#24
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
Well, johndee, aren't you a bucket of joy!  Let's see, you struggle through cpap insomnia, so I am sure you did not drive because you were sleep deprived. Your brother has untreated atrial fib, you have diagnosed him with SA but he will not get help. Your brother is a prime candidate for cardiac arrest. Does he drive? Many people here are sleep deprived before successfully using cpap, but without it they would be sleep deprived and/or critically damaging their cardiovascular system which eventually can lead to cardiac arrest  - while they are driving. I'm thinking that the doctor who didn't listen to me for two years should be sued for criminal negligence causing my accident. The doctors and nurses who cared for me in 2008 and did not tell me to seek help also contributed, so they should be sued too. And my current sleep doctor, yes, without a doubt, should lose her license for not prescribing euthanasia drugs instead of cpap. In fact, cpap should be illegal. Euthanasia is the treatment of choice. I'll call for an appointment with her first thing Monday morning . Ooops, my circadian rhythm has me sleeping from 2am to 10am, so I will call as soon as I wake up to make a euthanasia appointment.
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#25
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
setting aside right and wrong at the moment, this is all very comforting believe it or not. as kind and supportive as everyone here is, I am happy to know I'm not the only one sleep deprivation makes moody, snarky and short. (I take it on faith that cpap will help avoid nasty, brutish and short!) sorry for the suffering of others, but comforted there are others out there with experiences similar to mine.
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#26
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
Greenbean wrote:
" I still have a fear of driving over a half hour, which has been extremely limiting, but I must take an eight-hour drive in the near future. I have to figure out some way of sending alerts to myself every hour or so just to be sure I am awake because I had absolutely no prodromal signs before the guardrail was in front of me."

But you are the one making an active decision to go out on the road endangering yourself and others.
JD
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#27
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
Enough! If you have positive suggestions, make them. If you want to harass another member for being sleepy, you're going to be very busy. I think the point about the dangers of drowsy driving has been more than adequately made. Let's get back to finding solutions and helping.
Sleeprider
Apnea Board Moderator
www.ApneaBoard.com

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INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
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#28
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
OK Sleeprider...
I apologize to Greenbean. I lost a leg in an auto accident due to an impaired driver and am more then a little sensitive about that issue. So no more comments. Promise.
JD
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#29
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
Hi, I hope everyone is doing well.  Just wanted to check back in on this subject. 

Please be assured that I am not driving impaired.  I'm retired and therefore have plenty of opportunities to fortify myself with naps and lots of time to wake up in the morning.  I've never even come close to nodding off behind the wheel and if I felt so inclined I would get off the road right away.  I once almost got run over by a guy who went into diabetic coma while driving.  Missed me by a few feet, took out a street light, broken off a small tree, smashed his car all up...then he apparently woke up and made it home!  There was a trail of automobile fluids and parts all the way down the road.  Police eventually found him sitting in his driveway.  No charges were filled and he was off to the hospital.  So, while it wasn't a sleep related incident, I did have a pretty close brush with a badly impaired driver.

Wishing you sweet dreams
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#30
RE: Can Sleep Deprivation Become Emergency?
Just want to add something I witnessed a few years back when I was still working.  Retired now!  Yea!

I worked for a construction company as an Accounts Payable Adm.  Once a week, I was sent out to jobs sites to collect paper work from Superintendents.  We had many flaggers on the highway that afternoon due to lane closures.  At the time, I was in the office trailer and looked out the window at the exact time one of our flaggers was run down by an impaired driver.   No, the driver wasn't drinking, it was later determined he had untreated SA, and fell asleep at the wheel.  The flagger passed away a few hours later.  
She was a mother of three, a wife, a daughter to someone.   The impaired driver suffered minor injuries, but he has to live with this the rest of his life.
This is something I will never forget.

I don't tell this story to pick on anyone.  That's not my intent.  But I feel it is an important subject if it can be reasonably discussed.  If not....no need to comment.
OpalRose
Apnea Board Administrator
www.apneaboard.com

_______________________
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INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE.  ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA.  INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
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