Cracking the Sleep Code

Wear Your CPAP! Don't be Another Statistic

Why should you make such an effort to wear your CPAP?  Why not just wear your CPAP  'just enough' to say you're using it.  These troubling statistics are from the CPAP.CO.UK.  This company has a blog dedicated to education about the importance of CPAP.

• 34% of drivers who drove more than 20,000 miles a year admitted they had fallen asleep at the wheel during the previous 12 months (source: RAC)
• Sleepiness is the cause of an estimated 20% of all accidents on motorways.
• Sleepy driving has statistically been proven to be as dangerous as drunk driving.

You'll never get used to something unless you use it.  Here is a very interesting article from Medicalnewstoday.com.  The longer the treatment the better your results.

Sleep Less, Live Longer?

Calling all people with sleep disorders...listen up.  As you move through your journey on trying to achieve the optimal amount of sleep--- this article might help take some of the pressure off.  A study conducted by UCSD School of Medicine has some interesting information on the amount of sleep that is best for a longer life.  The most interesting point this study makes is that the participants that only slept an average of 5 hours a night lived longer than the people who slept 8 hours.

If anything, this information should make a difference to you because it lowers the bar for the amount of sleep you are trying to achieve.  Remember it's quality not quantity that makes a good nights sleep.

Sleep less, live longer?

Increased Death Rate Associated
With Sleeping 8 Hours or More

Although it’s a common belief that 8 hours of sleep is required for optimal health, a six-year study of more than one million adults ages 30 to 102 has shown that people who get only 6 to 7 hours a night have a lower death rate. Individuals who sleep 8 hours or more, or less than 4 hours a night, were shown to have a significantly increased death rate compared to those who averaged 6 to 7 hours.

Researchers from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine and the American Cancer Society collaborated on the study, which appeared in the February 15, 2002 issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, a journal of the American Medical Association.

Although the data indicated the highest mortality rates with long-duration sleep, the study could not explain the causes or reasons for this association...

 

Sleep Disorders: Don't be another statistic!

Even with all the warnings and extra knowledge on sleep apnea, many people still don't take it seriously enough.  For some, they know they snore and have been told by a partner that they stop breathing and still don't take action.  This type of person is a walking time bomb. The National Sleep Foundation reports "Sleep problems in general put drivers at risk for microsleeps.  Uncontrollable waves of fatigue where you nod off at the wheel.  Each year drowsy drivers cause at least 100,000 crashes, killing more than 1500 people and injuring another 71,000."

Besides auto accident deaths, individuals with sleep apnea are susceptible to other morbidities.  Cardiovascular disease, stroke, sudden cardiac death and congestive heart failure have come under the spotlight because of the new research correlating sleep apnea and these deadly diseases.

There are many cases of sleep apnea deaths but one that comes to my mind is of a 51 year old female who had a sleep study showing severe sleep apnea. She was scheduled for her CPAP titration study (the sleep study that fits a continuous positive airway mask at a certain pressure).  She canceled the study and rescheduled several times.  The next news I received was from her Doctor, saying that she had passed away in her sleep and that he was documenting the cause of death as sleep apnea.  The sleep lab had documentation of her canceling and their phone calls to reschedule her.  This was a very sad and unnecessary death as she had ignored her physicians warnings.

The moral of this story is that people die from sleep apnea.  It's important to point out that not all of them are obese and elderly as you might think.  As mentioned above, sleep disorders can be deadly.