If you are always feeling tired, no matter how much sleep you get, you may have obstructive sleep apnoea.

Obstructive sleep apnoea is when the airway gets repeatedly blocked during sleep. This can occur in people who have a narrow floppy throat, which is more likely to vibrate during sleep, causing snoring. In some cases, the blockage can occur to the point where breathing is reduced or completely stopped from 10 seconds up to a minute or more. The blood oxygen then drops as a result, and to stop suffocation from occurring, the body is woken up for a short period of time to allow breathing to resume before falling back to sleep again. This pattern can happen many times, even hundreds of times, during the night.

Sleep gets very badly affected with obstructive sleep apnoea, and can make someone very tired, grumpy and irritable throughout the day, especially in the afternoon. Some people even fall asleep while driving, risking the lives of themselves and others.

But did you know that there are real medical problems that can also develop from obstructive sleep apnoea? If you have obstructive sleep apnoea, you are more likely to have high blood pressure and other cardiovascular disease. There is also evidence that obstructive sleep apnoea is linked to diabetes, heart attack, stroke and depression.

Fortunately, good treatments are available for obstructive sleep apnoea. Oral appliances can be provided by eDentistry, which can help to open up the airway and restore normal breathing at night time.

If you are interested in knowing more about obstructive sleep apnoea, feel free to call eDentistry Wantirna on (03) 9800 1184 or send us an e-mail at info@edentistry.net.au and have a chat with us.