Encinitas Dental Sleep Apnea Care

Encinitas Dental Sleep Apnea Care

Encinitas Dental Sleep Apnea Care

Do you snore? Do you often wake from a night's sleep and still feel tired? Have you noticed that you are often drowsy or irritable during the day? You might be suffering from sleep apnea, a condition that affects over 20 million Americans.

What is Sleep Apnea?

The word apnea is derived from Greek (apnoia) and literally means "without breath." That is exactly what sleep apnea is when your breathing stops while you are sleeping. It is this that differentiates sleep apnea from simple snoring.

When a person suffers from sleep apnea, snoring is usually a symptom, but the real concern arises when snoring stops and the sleeper stops breathing. The body reacts, wakes the sleeper even though they are often not aware of waking and breathing starts again with a gasp. This pattern of snoring, breath cessation, waking and gasping happens over and over again through the night, leaving patients oxygen deprived and tired.

Here at the offices of D. Craig Fitch, DDS, we usually see people with obstructive sleep apnea, the most common form of apnea seen today. Obstructive sleep apnea occurs when the muscles around the tongue and the soft palate relax and become slack, blocking the airway.

What Are the Symptoms and Dangers of Sleep Apnea?

Sleep apnea is a very serious condition. It causes a drop in blood oxygen levels, which places stress on your heart and raises blood pressure. Sleep apnea also keeps you from properly entering REM sleep, the most restorative stage of nightly sleep. Because of this a variety of symptoms can develop, including:

Snoring

Night time sweating

Night time chest pain

Restlessness while sleeping

A feeling of waking unrefreshed

A feeling of severe or excessive daytime sleepiness

Morning headaches

Memory problems

Difficulty concentrating

Depression

Heart failure or heart attack

Stroke

How Can a Dentist Treat Sleep Apnea?

Because sleep apnea is usually caused by an airway blockage, a trained dentist can correct sleep apnea with a specially designed, custom created oral appliance. These appliances move the jaw forward to keep soft tissues from blocking the airway. An oral sleep apnea appliance is especially useful for those with mild to moderate sleep apnea and those who can't tolerate the typical treatment with a CPAP or a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure device. Many of our patients report that after just one night of using the appliance, they felt better and more rested than they had in years.

For more information about sleep apnea, or to find out if dental sleep apnea treatment from Dr. Craig Fitch can help you sleep better and feel healthier and more refreshed, call (760) 943-1449. You can also visit our website at www.cosmeticdentistencinitas.com where you can take the Epworth Sleepiness Scale test and see for yourself if you may be dealing with sleep apnea.

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