3 Side Effects Of Sleep Apnea: Get Dental Treatment To Avoid Them

If your wife is constantly complaining about your snoring, you may want to consider getting checked for sleep apnea. Sleep apnea is a condition that causes extreme snoring, but that is not the only effect it has; there are many others. Getting treatment for this condition is easy to do and can be accomplished by visiting a dentist. If you fail to get this diagnosed and treated, you may experience the following effects of untreated sleep apnea.

Sleepiness

Feeling tired all the time is a common side effect of sleep apnea. Sleep apnea is a condition that causes blockage in the throat while sleeping. Because of this, it causes a person to have trouble breathing, and it often stops a person from breathing. This occurs when the tissue in the back of throat doesn't move out of the way during normal breathing.

As this happens, the brain senses that you are not breathing and it triggers you to wake up. This cycle can occur many times during the night, and the result is a lack of good sleep. When you wake up in the morning, you may feel like you didn't get enough sleep. The feeling of being tired can carry on all day long, and you may never have the feeling that you are completely rested.

Feeling tired all the time is troublesome and can lead to other problems, including:

  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • Decreased performance at work or at home
  • Loss of interest in life and activities

If you snore a lot and feel tired all the time, you could be putting yourself at risk for many other serious health problems.

Solving this problem could be as simple as getting a dental mouth guard to wear while you sleep. With this device, your breathing passage will stay open while you sleep, and your wife may notice that you do not snore anymore.

Heart Problems

Sleep apnea is also linked to numerous health issues, including a variety of different types of heart problems. Each time you stop breathing in your sleep, you will gasp for breath. This occurs because your heart senses that you are not breathing, and this causes your heart to beat harder. This places extra pressure on your heart and eventually you may end up developing:

  • High blood pressure
  • Heart disease
  • Heart attack
  • Stroke

Anyone can develop sleep apnea; however, some people are more prone to it because of certain risk factors. In other words, you will have a higher chance of developing a heart problem from sleep apnea if you are:

  • Male
  • Overweight
  • A smoker
  • Older than 60

When a person is diagnosed with sleep apnea, the person's doctor often recommends losing weight, quitting smoking, and cutting out alcohol. Diagnosing this condition often requires a sleep study, which is a test used to see if a person stops breathing while asleep.

Your dentist can order a sleep study for you, which could be your first step to a healthier life. If you get treatment for your sleep apnea, your risks for developing heart problems will decrease significantly.

Personal Life

The third effect sleep apnea can have on you is problems with your personal life. Your marriage may suffer from this in several ways, but the first way is that it may cause you and your spouse to sleep in different rooms. If your wife cannot sleep because of your snoring, she may suggest sleeping in separate rooms. This may cause a decrease in the intimacy of the marriage, and it may cause you and your spouse to drift apart.

Sleep apnea is also linked to erectile dysfunction. When a man is not sleeping properly and is overtired, his body might reserve all the energy it has for more important tasks. Because of this, he may have problems achieving an erection.

If you believe that you might have sleep apnea, make an appointment with your dentist. Many dentists now offer treatment options for people suffering with sleep apnea and wearing a mouth guard is one of the simplest solutions for this condition. By getting the right treatment, you will reduce your risks of developing these serious health problems.


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