Sleep apnea increases with obesity; raises death risk upto 50 percent

Doctors at Johns Hopkins and seven other institutions measured the sleep and breathing patterns of around 6,400 people and followed them for eight continuous years, regardless of their age, sex, race, weight or smoking patterns, as reported in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine.

Adults younger than 70 years of age who suffered from the disorder, were twice as likely to die as those who slept normally.

Currently, 12 million U.S. Citizens are thought to have the sleep disorder. Tragedy is that four among five are unaware of the fact that they are suffering from the disease and are not getting treated for that, according to the National Institute of Health.

Another disadvantage of being obese
The rates of sleep apnea are rising gradually with obesity levels, as excess fat in the neck and throat can clog the airways, temporarily blocking them and forcing people to gasp for breath.

Jonathan Samet, co-author of the study and chairman of the department of preventive medicine at the University of Southern California, said “With the rising obesity epidemic in the U.S., this is of great concern. Almost 65 percent of adults now are overweight or obese. That’s causing more and more sleep-disordered breathing.”

Sleep apnea more common in men
The study findings have shown that sleep apnea is more common in men when compared to women. 24 percent of adult men and nine percent of women are suffering from the disorder, according to the NIH (National Institute of Health).

People with severe breathing disorders, were more likely to die from a variety of causes compared to similar people without such sleep disorders, Naresh Punjabi of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and colleagues found.

The study proceedings
In the study, the subjects were measured by a machine while they were asleep at home. The device recorded the number and length of interruptions to their breathing, the whole night.

In the eight long years, 1,047 of the study participants died. For men between 40 to 70 years, whose breathing was blocked the most often (30 or more times per hour) the risk of dying doubled.

The number of women, published the journal PLOS Medicine, was too small to provide any statistically meaningful results.

The best treatment within your reach
Dr. David Rapoport of New York University, who worked on the study said, “The best treatment for sleep apnea is weight loss. However, the most successful treatment can be a nasal CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) mask that applies pressure to help keep the airways of a patient open while they sleep, allowing normal breathing.”

“Another possible helpful treatment is surgery. That may include tonsil removal. A mouth guard that pulls a patient's mouth forward is another option,” he added.

About sleep apnea
Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder characterized by pauses in breathing during one's sleep. Each episode, called an apnea, lasts long enough where one or more breaths are missed, and such episodes occur repeatedly throughout the sleep.

It is caused by a collapse of the upper airway during the sleep. A strong symptom for this disorder is snoring. The disease is closely linked with obesity, high BP, heart failure and stroke.

"In severe sleep apnea a patient's airway is blocked while the patient suffers for 20 to 30 seconds and wakes up. When it becomes this frequent, 30 times per hour, about every two minutes it is severe sleep apnea and can become a problem," said Dr. David Rapoport in his statement.