What Are the Most Common Sleep Disorders?

What are the Most Common Sleep Disorders?

Sleep is one of our most basic needs as humans and yet almost all of us will experience some kind of sleep disorder during our lifetime. Sleep deficiency can lead to a number of serious medical conditions and even reduce your life span. Sure everyone has a bad night's sleep, but a consistent pattern of poor sleep may indicate an underlying sleep disorder that requires attention. Here are the signs and symptoms of the most common sleep disorders.

Insomnia

Is insomnia the real reason you're not sleeping? While insomnia is characterized by difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep it doesn't always work alone. Insomnia is both a disorder and a common symptom of many other sleep disorders like sleep apnea or snoring. Sometimes a person with insomnia is experiencing insomnia as a secondary issue and should address the primary cause of their inability to sleep. A person with insomnia can have trouble sleeping anywhere from a few days to several months. It's the reason for this inability to sleep that's the real cause for concern. No matter how long, you're not sleeping, and this can lead to functional destruction, a compromised health and could require treatment.

Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea involves the failure to breathe normally while sleeping. It can be caused by insufficient respiratory effort, called central sleep apnea or by a physical blockage, called obstructive sleep apnea. According to the National Institute of Health, a person with sleep apnea can have abnormal pauses in breath that last for as little as a second to several minutes. These pauses can occur five to 30 times per hour! That's a lot of work on a person's body that's trying to rest!

Symptoms of sleep apnea include:

* Loud, chronic snoring

* Frequent pauses in breathing during sleep

* Gasping, snorting, or choking during sleep

* Feeling unrefreshed after waking and sleepy during the day, no matter how much time you spent in bed

* Waking up with shortness of breath, chest pains, headaches, nasal congestion, or a dry throat.

Ironically, most people who suffer sleep apnea aren't even aware of it their body is so tired from its breathing efforts that often times it's a person's bed partner who voices the issue. Snoring is actually a common symptom of obstructive sleep apnea and can be an sign of a larger problem when paired with tiredness and the feeling, upon waking, as though you haven't slept. Diagnosis is generally made after a sleep study is completed.

Treatments for sleep apnea range from lifestyle changes to surgery, depending on the severity and cause of the apnea. Most people, however, are treated with a CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) machine which forces the airway open during sleep using a constant flow of air.

Narcolepsy

This neurological disorder is generally connected with people who randomly fall asleep in the midst of doing something. While this can occur, the primary symptom of narcolepsy is excessive daytime sleepiness. Those who suffer from the condition can have the overwhelming urge to fall asleep at inappropriate times and with little warning as a result of this excessive sleepiness. Narcoleptics can also have episodes of cataplexy, a sudden attack of muscle weakness ranging from slurred speech to complete collapse.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, Narcolepsy results when the brain is unable to regulate sleep-wake cycles. For most people, the process of falling asleep involves a progression through several specific stages beginning with non-REM sleep that gradually deepens until we enter REM sleep and are able to dream. Narcoleptics skip most of the stages and jump directly in and out of REM sleep, resulting in significantly less deep, restorative sleep. Other symptoms including hypnologic hallucinations and sleep paralysis occur during the transition from sleeping to waking and are thought to be caused by this rapid descent into and back out of a REM state.

Narcolepsy can often be successfully treated through medication and behavioral therapy.

Restless legs syndrome (RLS)

Restless legs syndrome (RLS) is a sleep disorder that causes an almost appealing urge to move your legs (or arms). The urge to move occurs when you're resting or lying down and is usually due to uncomfortable, tingly, aching, or creeping sensations.

Common signs and symptoms of restless legs syndrome include:

* Uncomfortable sensations deep within the legs, accompanied by a strong urge to move them.

* The leg sensations are triggered by rest and get worse at night.

* The uncomfortable sensations temporarily get better when you move, stretch, or massage your legs.

* Repetitive cramping or jerking of the legs during sleep.

Circadian rhythm sleep disorders

We all have an internal biological clock that regulates our 24-hour sleep-wake cycle, also known as our circadian rhythms. Light is the primary cue that influences circadian rhythms. When the sun comes up in the morning, the brain tells the body that it's time to wake up. At night, when there is less light, your brain triggers the release of melatonin, a hormone that makes you sleepy.

When circadian rhythms are disrupted or thrown off, you may feel groggy, disoriented, and sleepy at inconvenient times. Circadian rhythms have been linked to a variety or sleeping problems and sleep disorders, including insomnia, jet lag, and shift work sleep difficulties. Abnormal circadian rhythms have also been implicated in depression, bipolar disorder, and seasonal affective disorder, or the winter blues.

Jet lag sleeping problems

Jet lag is a temporary disruption in circadian rhythms that occurs when you travel across time zones. Symptoms include daytime sleepiness, fatigue, headache, stomach problems, and insomnia. The symptoms typically appear within a day or two after flying across two or more time zones. The longer the flight, the more pronounced the symptoms. The direction of flight also makes a difference. Flying east tends to cause worse jet lag than flying west.

In general, it usually takes one day per time zone crossed to adjust to the local time. So