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Sleep what is it - Printable Version

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Sleep what is it - Muddpa - 03-12-2013



What is the bottom line?

Are we just trying to keep breathing?

Are we trying to get a quality or quantity of sleep?

What is too much, what is not enough?

We know without the equipment we could stop breathing. What is our goal?
Is there a cure? We sent a man to the moon, but we can't cure apnea.

Thanks for reading my thoughts, what do you think?

Sleep-well

Muddpa




RE: Sleep what is it - PollCat - 03-12-2013

To misquote René Descartes: "I sleep, therefore I am". Or more importantly: I sleep with a CPAP, therfore I am still alive!


RE: Sleep what is it - Muddpa - 03-12-2013

(03-12-2013, 05:07 PM)PollCat Wrote: To misquote René Descartes: "I sleep, therefore I am". Or more importantly: I sleep with a CPAP, therfore I am still alive!

hi bob, thanks for the info. took survey.


RE: Sleep what is it - PaulaO2 - 03-12-2013

It's kinda like with better breathing, we get better sleep. Our bodies and brains aren't waking up x a hour and our cells are getting adequate oxygen. There is no cure for sleep apnea. There is treatment. And the treatment works. Do I mind sleeping with a machine hooked to my nose every night? Every night for the rest of my life? Yeah, sure, I hate it. But it sure as heck beats the alternative!

As for sleep quality, we are all different. Some folks can survive just fine with less, some need more. Some can only sleep in certain conditions, some can sleep anywhere at any time. Then there's the food we eat, the liquids we drink, the stress we have, the fun we have - all of it contributes to quality of sleep.

If you feel you are not getting enough sleep or getting quality sleep, then evaluate your situation. Look into sleep hygiene. Talk to your regular doctor. If you take medication, discuss them with your doc or pharmacist to decide if any of them are interfering with sleep.


RE: Sleep what is it - Sleepster - 03-13-2013

(03-12-2013, 04:58 PM)Muddpa Wrote: Are we trying to get a quality or quantity of sleep?

Yes, to both.

Quote: What is too much, what is not enough?

For me there's no such thing as not enough. I average 9 hours a night of CPAP use. I'm probably asleep for at least 8 to 8.5 hours, but there are a lot of awakenings and not enough time spent in deep sleep.

Quote:We know without the equipment we could stop breathing. What is our goal?

To keep breathing.

Quote:Is there a cure? We sent a man to the moon, but we can't cure apnea.

There's a cure. They cut a hole in your throat and insert a sleeve with a stopper. Before going to bed you take the stopper out, then when you wake up in the morning you put the stopper back in.

I'll take the CPAP therapy, but if you're unlucky enough that a CPAP machine won't exert enough pressure to open your airway surgery is the only option left. And unless you get the radical surgery I just described there's a very good chance you'll still need a CPAP machine afterwards.

There are a variety of surgeries available, and there's a new high tech version using robotic surgery. The problems they cause, or their low success rate, make them not worth the cure in a lot of cases!



RE: Sleep what is it - DocWils - 03-13-2013

Sleepster - we don't consider a Tracheotomy a cure. It is a work around just as CPAP is - therapeutic only but it does not stop the cause, and it doesn't always work - in fact one reason we don't often do them any more is that they don't really work all that well in returning sleep quality to a lot of patients. Plus infection rates are lousy. And other complications as well. That is pretty much 1950's methods and long since dropped except for emergencies to save lives in immediate danger where intubation is either impractical or impossible or won't work. As a general therapy method, anyone who does it it today either has no other option to help the patient or aught to have their license lifted.

A cure means the cause is stopped. Cutting a hole in the throat to bypass the area of collapse won't do that and sometimes won't work, either.

So, what are cures? In a lot of cases, the best way is to lose weight and retone the muscles of the throat, using a Didgeridoo.
But that doesn't work in all cases, because the cause is not fat related or comes from elsewhere - in some cases, surgery is required to shorten the uvula or make other adjustments. They don't always work either. Plastic strips are inserted into the soft palette and the back of the throat sometimes - they don't always work, either. From a medical standpoint, CPAP is the best and cheapest response to the problem, and one that has the highest success rate, even though it is purely therapeutic in nature, meaning that if you don't use it for one session, the condition is still there and will immediately return. After that, for most common types of apnoea, weight loss and Didgeridoo. Surgery is almost always a poor third place to these.

And lose weight anyway, you'll feel better and sleep better no matter what, even if on a CPAP (in fact, one great problem is that some people on CPAP gain weight, mostly because they think they can eat whatever they want now that they have the problem in hand - no - do not go that route. Weight induced apnoea is a warning sign of other, deeper problems waiting to bite you, and the way to avoid the bite is to drop the excess avoirdupois).


RE: Sleep what is it - zimlich - 03-13-2013

I don't agree about the trach. If you have obstructive sleep apnea trach removes the obstruction and therefore is a cure. I know of only one person who has a trach, a doctor who used to post on ***. If you have central apnea- no a trach won't cure that, but for garden variety a trach is a sure cure.


RE: Sleep what is it - zimlich - 03-13-2013

Where did my post go, moderator? That wasn't a link it was a word and if you don't put it back I am out of here


RE: Sleep what is it - zimlich - 03-13-2013

Who is moderating this morning?
The heck with it, I'm gone.


RE: Sleep what is it - Sleepster - 03-13-2013

(03-13-2013, 08:44 AM)zimlich Wrote: Where did my post go, moderator? That wasn't a link it was a word and if you don't put it back I am out of here

Any action taken by an Apnea Board moderator or admin will be identified as such. I'm not sure how that word got changed to a string of asterisks. Probably something done automatically by some software somewhere.