Sciota, Pennsylvania
You need a good night’s sleep to be at your best every day. We all experience a night of little to no sleep once in a while, but living with sleep loss has a host of negative consequences that affect your health, your focus and even your relationship. Today on the blog, Chestnuthill Dental examines how sleeping problems can negatively impact your relationship.
What happens when you don’t get enough sleep?
Sleep is more about quality than quantity. Six hours of deep, restful sleep will benefit your mind and body more than seven or more hours of erratic sleep where you spend less time in the deepest stages of the sleep cycle. Living with consistent sleep loss leads to sleep deprivation. It becomes more difficult to focus at work or school. Over time, living with sleep loss can make you more irritable. You may experience unexplainable mood swings or become angry without reason. Suffice to say, these issues can strain your relationship with your partner.
Identify the cause of your sleep loss
Lifestyle choices can make it more difficult to fall asleep or stay asleep. Eating a healthy diet, getting regular exercise, avoiding caffeine late in the day, cutting back on alcohol and finding ways to limit stress all can help improve both the duration and the quality of your sleep. However, another culprit behind sleep loss is obstructive sleep apnea – a sleep breathing disorder that refers to any condition where breathing is impeded or or completely disrupted while a person sleeps.
What happens when you have sleep apnea?
A sleep apnea patient experiences blockages of the airway that are either partial or complete. When one of these blockages, known as an apneic event, occurs, it eventually causes oxygen levels to decrease. That prompts the brain to send signals to the body to resume normal breathing. Someone with sleep apnea may never consciously awake during an apneic event, but this alert to the body brings you out of the sleep cycle, meaning you spend less time in the deepest stages of sleep. Now, when you consider that someone with severe and untreated sleep apnea may experience hundreds of apneic events each night, you can see the impact this can have on your ability to get rest.
Identifying and treating sleep apnea in Sciota, Pennsylvania
If you or someone you love has sleep apnea, just ignoring this problem is the worst decision that you can make. Instead, your sleep apnea will continue to get worse, degrading the quality of your sleep and compromising your overall health and wellness. People living with untreated sleep apnea also face a higher risk of a wide array of chronic and potentially deadly health conditions, including heart disease, stroke, diabetes and even certain forms of cancer.
While a sleep apnea diagnosis only can come from a qualified sleep specialist, a sleep apnea dentist can provide treatment for a case of sleep apnea. Your dentist can treat sleep apnea in Sciota without CPAP. Instead, we can provide an oral appliance that brings your lower jaw forward and maintains an open airway throughout the night.
If you want to learn more about our sleep apnea treatment, schedule a consultation by calling (570) 402-4001 or visit our website.
