A good nights sleep is vital to your everyday health. Sleep apnea, which is defined as a reduction or cessation of breathing during sleep, is a major cause of sleep deprivation. If left untreated, sleep apnea can affect your thinking, work and school performance and even your weight.
Listen as Talha Memon, MD discusses sleep disorders and the importance of getting a good nights sleep to help you stay healthy.
Selected Podcast
Having Trouble Sleeping? Temecula Can Help
Featured Speaker:
Talha Memon, MD
Talha Memon, MD is a Sleep Medicine physician and a member of the Medical Staff at Temecula Valley Hospital. Transcription:
Having Trouble Sleeping? Temecula Can Help
Melanie Cole (Host): Sleep apnea is a common disorder in which you have one or more pauses in breathing or shallow breaths while you sleep. If left untreated, sleep apnea can increase the risk of high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke, obesity, diabetes, and more. My guest today is Dr. Talha Memon. He's a sleep medicine and family physician and a member of the medical staff at Temecula Valley Hospital. Welcome to the show, Dr. Memon. What is sleep apnea and who is most at risk for it?
Dr. Talha Memon (Guest): So, sleep apnea is a condition in your upper airway or obstructive sleep apnea is a condition in your upper airway, where the airway could potentially collapse in the middle of the night, either a partial collapse or a complete collapse of the airway. When that happens, oxygen flow doesn't go in and out of the body. When oxygen isn't going in and out of the body, it causes your brain to wake up or get aroused for a few seconds. If this is happening multiple times throughout the night, your sleep quality gets fragmented throughout the night. It's as if someone is waking you up 10, 15, 20 times an hour. So sleep apnea is, in essence, a condition where you have these pauses or interruptions in breathing patterns. As far as the people that are most likely or prone to having it, typically individuals that have a body mass index, or are larger individuals, tend to have it. Individuals that have larger neck sizes tend to have it. Older individuals also are more prone to developing sleep apnea as well.
Melanie: So, would you know if you had sleep apnea, or does it generally come from your partner hearing you do these breathing things in the middle of the night?
Dr. Memon: Well, one way to find out, and most of the patients that I see in clinic usually come because their significant other or their spouse complains of their snoring or the pauses in breathing. Other times, patients come in because they just feel sleepy throughout the day. They feel tired and they feel groggy and they wake up from their sleep and they just don't feel they got refreshing sleep or they don't feel you know, energetic in the morning. Most of the time, patients come for those symptoms.
Melanie: How is it diagnosed? People have heard about sleep studies, Dr. Memon, and they say, "Well, can I even get a decent night's sleep if I'm doing a sleep study?" So, tell us about a sleep study and how you diagnose sleep apnea.
Dr. Memon: Absolutely. So, there are two ways to diagnose sleep apnea. One is through an in-lab polysomnography, which is an in-lab sleep study and that entails going into a sleep facility and it's like checking into a hotel. You go in around 6-7 pm. You bring your pj's and toothbrush and you basically go there and sleep the night. The technician hooks up a bunch of electrodes on your scalp, on your nose, on your chest, on your arms and legs and it's all these wires that go around your body and they basically measure your brain activity, your breathing patterns, your heart rate, and your airflow, and all these things put together determine if you have sleep apnea or don't have sleep apnea. I actually did one of the sleep studies myself and I must say, it was a bit challenging to fall asleep initially. So, I typically fall asleep within about five, ten minutes. It probably took me about 20 or so minutes to fall asleep. So, I think the initial portion of it is a little more difficult to fall asleep, but most people tend to be able to sleep in the sleep study. All we need, truly, is about three to four hours of good data and that's enough to diagnose whether you have it or don't. The other option in terms of diagnosing sleep apnea is through a home sleep study, which can be done at home at the convenience of your own bed and if your doctor feels like you're a good candidate for that, then you can get that done, as well.
Melanie: If you've determined that someone does have apnea, then what are some first line treatments?
Dr. Memon: So, our gold standard treatment is the CPAP device which stands for “continuous positive airway pressure” therapy. It basically is a device that stands for, like I mentioned, continuous positive airway pressure therapy and it shoots positive pressure through this box or this apparatus, which connects to a tube, which connects to a face mask, and the whole idea behind a CPAP is to keep your airway open like a splint at night when you're sleeping. So, that's one option that you have. Another option is an oral appliance which you see heavily advertised these days on TV. They may work in a very few subset of population but, overall, it doesn't work too well; and then, you have surgery as a final option. Again, options two and three, which are oral appliance and surgery, are usually not the best treatment options for sleep apnea.
Melanie: What about lifestyle changes? What lifestyle changes do you recommend patients do to help them with their sleep apnea? Are there things that they can do?
Dr. Memon: Well, clearly, weight's a big component of developing sleep apnea and lifestyle changes in terms of weight loss plays a key role in at least eliminating or reducing the sleep apnea. So, a lot of the times, I usually recommend patients to start exercising and simple exercising could be just walking. Walking for about 30 minutes a day for five days a week is considered excellent exercise for the body. Eating right also plays a key role in that, as well. Carbs is such a key component to our diets with bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, sugary drinks--all these things play a big role in terms of weight gain. If we start to watch what we're eating and try to minimize the intake of these things that potentially helps with reducing sleep apnea as well.
Melanie: People like to say a glass of wine helps them to sleep. Is that a myth?
Dr. Memon: No, it's absolutely right. A glass of wine will help you fall asleep, but the problem is, alcohol tends to cause early morning awakenings. So, it may allow you to fall asleep quickly, but it's also going to cause you to wake up pretty quickly, also.
Melanie: So, kind of give it a wrap up for us about sleep apnea and what you want listeners to know about recognizing the symptoms and, if left untreated, the complications that could arise?
Dr. Memon: If you're at home, either you or your partner, and you notice snoring or you notice pauses in breathing and if you're complaining of feeling tired, fatigued, groggy, sleepy, then sleep apnea is definitely something that needs to be considered as a diagnosis. If you're feeling these symptoms, you potentially might want to go see your local doctor to discuss those symptoms. Sleep apnea is really important to diagnose and to treat, primarily because of its cardiovascular risk and the effects it may have. Just like when you have high blood pressure, you try to treat it to reduce or minimize the risk of stroke and heart attack, similarly, when you have sleep apnea, you're also at a higher risk for developing high blood pressure, stroke, different arrhythmias, or irregular heartbeats, and coronary artery disease, or heart attacks. So, these are all important things that we need to obviously prevent to live a longer and healthier life, and sleep apnea can potentially cause that. So, to treat sleep apnea would potentially reduce the risk of these things and that's quite important.
Melanie: Dr. Memon, just a little advice about sleep hygiene. What do you tell people about the importance of getting that good quality night's sleep?
Dr. Memon: I think maintaining a consistent schedule is very crucial. I see a lot of patients that come in with these weird, not weird, but these long duration of bedtime schedules in the sense of they're lying in bed from 9pm to 9am, or they're on their phones, and browsing the internet in their beds. So, I think what's probably the most crucial component of a good sleep hygiene is maintaining a good time to go to bed and good time to wake up and being consistent about that. You don't want to spend more than about 8 hours in bed consistently. So, maintaining a good bedtime schedule, a good wake time schedule is important, and always keeping about 30-45 minutes before bedtime as down time to relax, to kick back, to take some time out for yourself, but that doesn't necessarily mean getting on an iPhone or you know, giving yourself too many things that stimulate the brain because that, obviously, will impede your ability to fall asleep if you're trying to sleep right after that.
Melanie: Why should they come to Temecula Valley Hospital for their care?
Dr. Memon: So, Temecula Valley Hospital is a great hospital because of the multi-disciplinary approach that they have. We have physicians that come from all various backgrounds and do various different specialties and they truly care for their patients and that's truly seen when you see the patients and their satisfaction.
Melanie: Thank you so much for being with us today, Dr. Memon. You're listening to TVH DocTalk with Temecula Valley Hospital. For more information, you can go to www.temeculavalleyhospital.com. That's www.temeculavalleyhospital.com. Physicians are independent practitioners who are not employees or agents of Temecula Valley Hospital. The hospital shall not be liable for actions or treatments provided by physicians. This is Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening.
Having Trouble Sleeping? Temecula Can Help
Melanie Cole (Host): Sleep apnea is a common disorder in which you have one or more pauses in breathing or shallow breaths while you sleep. If left untreated, sleep apnea can increase the risk of high blood pressure, heart attack, stroke, obesity, diabetes, and more. My guest today is Dr. Talha Memon. He's a sleep medicine and family physician and a member of the medical staff at Temecula Valley Hospital. Welcome to the show, Dr. Memon. What is sleep apnea and who is most at risk for it?
Dr. Talha Memon (Guest): So, sleep apnea is a condition in your upper airway or obstructive sleep apnea is a condition in your upper airway, where the airway could potentially collapse in the middle of the night, either a partial collapse or a complete collapse of the airway. When that happens, oxygen flow doesn't go in and out of the body. When oxygen isn't going in and out of the body, it causes your brain to wake up or get aroused for a few seconds. If this is happening multiple times throughout the night, your sleep quality gets fragmented throughout the night. It's as if someone is waking you up 10, 15, 20 times an hour. So sleep apnea is, in essence, a condition where you have these pauses or interruptions in breathing patterns. As far as the people that are most likely or prone to having it, typically individuals that have a body mass index, or are larger individuals, tend to have it. Individuals that have larger neck sizes tend to have it. Older individuals also are more prone to developing sleep apnea as well.
Melanie: So, would you know if you had sleep apnea, or does it generally come from your partner hearing you do these breathing things in the middle of the night?
Dr. Memon: Well, one way to find out, and most of the patients that I see in clinic usually come because their significant other or their spouse complains of their snoring or the pauses in breathing. Other times, patients come in because they just feel sleepy throughout the day. They feel tired and they feel groggy and they wake up from their sleep and they just don't feel they got refreshing sleep or they don't feel you know, energetic in the morning. Most of the time, patients come for those symptoms.
Melanie: How is it diagnosed? People have heard about sleep studies, Dr. Memon, and they say, "Well, can I even get a decent night's sleep if I'm doing a sleep study?" So, tell us about a sleep study and how you diagnose sleep apnea.
Dr. Memon: Absolutely. So, there are two ways to diagnose sleep apnea. One is through an in-lab polysomnography, which is an in-lab sleep study and that entails going into a sleep facility and it's like checking into a hotel. You go in around 6-7 pm. You bring your pj's and toothbrush and you basically go there and sleep the night. The technician hooks up a bunch of electrodes on your scalp, on your nose, on your chest, on your arms and legs and it's all these wires that go around your body and they basically measure your brain activity, your breathing patterns, your heart rate, and your airflow, and all these things put together determine if you have sleep apnea or don't have sleep apnea. I actually did one of the sleep studies myself and I must say, it was a bit challenging to fall asleep initially. So, I typically fall asleep within about five, ten minutes. It probably took me about 20 or so minutes to fall asleep. So, I think the initial portion of it is a little more difficult to fall asleep, but most people tend to be able to sleep in the sleep study. All we need, truly, is about three to four hours of good data and that's enough to diagnose whether you have it or don't. The other option in terms of diagnosing sleep apnea is through a home sleep study, which can be done at home at the convenience of your own bed and if your doctor feels like you're a good candidate for that, then you can get that done, as well.
Melanie: If you've determined that someone does have apnea, then what are some first line treatments?
Dr. Memon: So, our gold standard treatment is the CPAP device which stands for “continuous positive airway pressure” therapy. It basically is a device that stands for, like I mentioned, continuous positive airway pressure therapy and it shoots positive pressure through this box or this apparatus, which connects to a tube, which connects to a face mask, and the whole idea behind a CPAP is to keep your airway open like a splint at night when you're sleeping. So, that's one option that you have. Another option is an oral appliance which you see heavily advertised these days on TV. They may work in a very few subset of population but, overall, it doesn't work too well; and then, you have surgery as a final option. Again, options two and three, which are oral appliance and surgery, are usually not the best treatment options for sleep apnea.
Melanie: What about lifestyle changes? What lifestyle changes do you recommend patients do to help them with their sleep apnea? Are there things that they can do?
Dr. Memon: Well, clearly, weight's a big component of developing sleep apnea and lifestyle changes in terms of weight loss plays a key role in at least eliminating or reducing the sleep apnea. So, a lot of the times, I usually recommend patients to start exercising and simple exercising could be just walking. Walking for about 30 minutes a day for five days a week is considered excellent exercise for the body. Eating right also plays a key role in that, as well. Carbs is such a key component to our diets with bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, sugary drinks--all these things play a big role in terms of weight gain. If we start to watch what we're eating and try to minimize the intake of these things that potentially helps with reducing sleep apnea as well.
Melanie: People like to say a glass of wine helps them to sleep. Is that a myth?
Dr. Memon: No, it's absolutely right. A glass of wine will help you fall asleep, but the problem is, alcohol tends to cause early morning awakenings. So, it may allow you to fall asleep quickly, but it's also going to cause you to wake up pretty quickly, also.
Melanie: So, kind of give it a wrap up for us about sleep apnea and what you want listeners to know about recognizing the symptoms and, if left untreated, the complications that could arise?
Dr. Memon: If you're at home, either you or your partner, and you notice snoring or you notice pauses in breathing and if you're complaining of feeling tired, fatigued, groggy, sleepy, then sleep apnea is definitely something that needs to be considered as a diagnosis. If you're feeling these symptoms, you potentially might want to go see your local doctor to discuss those symptoms. Sleep apnea is really important to diagnose and to treat, primarily because of its cardiovascular risk and the effects it may have. Just like when you have high blood pressure, you try to treat it to reduce or minimize the risk of stroke and heart attack, similarly, when you have sleep apnea, you're also at a higher risk for developing high blood pressure, stroke, different arrhythmias, or irregular heartbeats, and coronary artery disease, or heart attacks. So, these are all important things that we need to obviously prevent to live a longer and healthier life, and sleep apnea can potentially cause that. So, to treat sleep apnea would potentially reduce the risk of these things and that's quite important.
Melanie: Dr. Memon, just a little advice about sleep hygiene. What do you tell people about the importance of getting that good quality night's sleep?
Dr. Memon: I think maintaining a consistent schedule is very crucial. I see a lot of patients that come in with these weird, not weird, but these long duration of bedtime schedules in the sense of they're lying in bed from 9pm to 9am, or they're on their phones, and browsing the internet in their beds. So, I think what's probably the most crucial component of a good sleep hygiene is maintaining a good time to go to bed and good time to wake up and being consistent about that. You don't want to spend more than about 8 hours in bed consistently. So, maintaining a good bedtime schedule, a good wake time schedule is important, and always keeping about 30-45 minutes before bedtime as down time to relax, to kick back, to take some time out for yourself, but that doesn't necessarily mean getting on an iPhone or you know, giving yourself too many things that stimulate the brain because that, obviously, will impede your ability to fall asleep if you're trying to sleep right after that.
Melanie: Why should they come to Temecula Valley Hospital for their care?
Dr. Memon: So, Temecula Valley Hospital is a great hospital because of the multi-disciplinary approach that they have. We have physicians that come from all various backgrounds and do various different specialties and they truly care for their patients and that's truly seen when you see the patients and their satisfaction.
Melanie: Thank you so much for being with us today, Dr. Memon. You're listening to TVH DocTalk with Temecula Valley Hospital. For more information, you can go to www.temeculavalleyhospital.com. That's www.temeculavalleyhospital.com. Physicians are independent practitioners who are not employees or agents of Temecula Valley Hospital. The hospital shall not be liable for actions or treatments provided by physicians. This is Melanie Cole. Thanks so much for listening.