Pulmonary Disorder: Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Good afternoon friends,

I am Dr Hemant Kalra, I am a pulmonologist.

Today I will talk about a very-very important topic that is Obstructive Sleep Apnea which is widely prevalent in our country but very-very underdiagnose and awareness is very-very less. So what is obstructive sleep apnea, those patients who snore very-very heavily, who feel tired or feel sleepy during the daytime they may have Obstructive Sleep Apnea. So what is normal breathing, normal breathing is when our upper airways they allow free air to go inside the lungs and out of the lungs, this is normal breathing. So what are the obstructive airways, obstructive airways is then these upper airways collapse and this collapse of upper airways causes snoring and sensation in breathing, this is abnormal breathing or obstructive breathing at night time when we sleep? So what are the symptoms, symptoms can be nighttime symptoms can be there or daytime symptoms can be there. Night time symptoms are frequent visits to bathroom, weakness, sensation in breathing, choking or gasping for air or loud a persistent snoring or restless sleep, these 5 can be there in the night time symptoms and daytime symptoms are early morning headache, lethargy, and poor concentration, poor memory, feeling asleep during and routine activities and daytime somnolence or daytime sleepiness, these are daytime symptoms. So what kinds of patients are prone to have obstructive sleep apnea. Those patients who are obese with a short and thick neck with large tongue or hypothyroidism such patients if they snore heavily or feel tired or sleepy during the daytime or if they have night time or daytime and symptoms they must be investigated for obstructive sleep apnea. So how to diagnose obstructive sleep apnea, there is a very small test called polysomnography that can be done at a house or in hospitals. That is conducted in two parts, one is diagnostic, one is titration in diagnostic. We diagnose, whether a patient is having obstructive episodes in the night or not, or in another part, if an obstruction is there what is the pressure required to eliminate those obstructions in the night time. So obstructive diagnostic and titration component one night sleep steady is more than enough. Once we diagnose obstructive sleep apnea then we have to treat it also. There are so many treatments available but gold standard till now is CPAP therapy Continuous Positive Airway Pressure therapy is the most appropriate therapy to treat obstructive sleep apnea and once you treated you will feel that next day if you get up you will feel very-very energetic and if you do not treat obstructive sleep apnea then you may have heart problems, rythm problems, your BP may not be controlled, your sugar may not be control, you may have strokes in future also. So, if you treat obstructive sleep apnea with CPAP therapy, it is a gold standard therapy in India it is widely available in our country but lack of awareness is there. It is a very important disorder you must be treated as early as possible.

Thank you.