Sleep Apnea and Your Heart

Why a troublesome sleep spells trouble for your health

You know what it’s like trying to get through the day without a good night’s sleep. You feel fatigued and irritable, and you can’t concentrate. If you regularly feel this way, you may have sleep apnea, a disorder in which a narrowed airway keeps interrupting your breathing and waking you.

Sleep apnea commonly affects people who are obese, especially men with large necks. But it also can occur if you have a naturally narrow airway or a large tongue. “The condition is very serious because it directly affects your heart health,” says electrophysiologist (heart rhythm specialist) Vadim Levin, M.D., of Lehigh Valley Hospital and Health Network.

For one thing, apnea raises blood pressure. “When you stop breathing, your body produces a burst of adrenaline as you gasp for air,” says pulmonologist Richard Strobel, M.D., of the hospital’s Sleep Disorders Center. “This causes sudden spikes in blood pressure that damage your heart.”

High blood pressure, in turn, raises the risk for atrial fibrillation, a condition that causes the heart to beat irregularly. “Also, when you try to breathe against a closed airway while asleep, the pressure in the chest can stretch the heart muscle. This can weaken the heart over time and also affect the beat,” Levin says. When your heart doesn’t beat properly, blood can pool or clot and cause a heart attack or stroke.

Not getting quality sleep can have other deadly consequences. “There is strong evidence linking sleep apnea and car accidents,” says Jeff Brown, D.O., a family medicine physician at the hospital.

For all these reasons, see your doctor if you’re experiencing any symptoms (see box).

He or she may recommend a sleep study. If it confirms the condition, you’ll need to avoid sleeping pills or alcohol, which can make sleep apnea worse. The best treatment is CPAP,* a machine that blows humidified air into a nasal mask to keep your airway open through the night. “You get used to wearing it in a few weeks,” Strobel says. “CPAP helps you sleep better and improves your heart health at the same time.”

Want to Know More about sleep apnea in children, or how CPAP made a difference in one woman’s life? Call 610-402-CARE or click here.

Published from Healthy You Magazine, November-December 2007

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