Who Suffers from Sleep Apnea?

Sleep apnea can lead to a number of serious health concerns, so it’s important to understand if you are at risk.

Who suffers from sleep apnea? Sleep apnea can happen to anyone at any age, from infancy all the way to adulthood. It is more common in males. It is also more common among adults 40 years old and above.

Sleep apnea is a serious sleep disorder where one’s breathing stops and starts repeatedly.

Read more to find out what usually causes sleep apnea, what the different kinds are, and what the risk factors include.

Who Can Have Sleep Apnea?

Anybody can have sleep apnea — infants, children, and adults.

Before we jump into the risks of sleep apnea among these three age groups, we should first understand what types of sleep apnea there are.

Sleep apnea can be classified into two general types:

Obstructive sleep apnea – This is the more common form. It is caused by any form of obstruction in the airways, usually in the form of soft tissues at the back of your throat collapsing backwards.
Central sleep apnea – In this type of apnea, the airways are not blocked, but the brain does not send the right message to the parts of your body in charge of breathing.

It is possible for sleep apnea patients to have a mix of these two types as well.

So who can have obstructive sleep apnea, and who can have central sleep apnea?

Sleep apnea in infants

Sleep apnea is more common in pre-term infants. Here are the numbers:

84% of infants who weigh less than 2.2 lbs are most likely to have sleep apnea on the 1st month.
25% of infants who weight less than 5.5 lbs are most likely to have sleep apnea on the 1st month.

Sleep apnea is rare in healthy, full-term newborns.

When it comes to infant sleep apnea, it is usually a mix of central sleep apnea and obstructive sleep apnea. These stem from two major causes:

The brain stem has not fully matured yet because of developmental issues.
There is another medical condition present and sleep apnea is one of the complications.

The good thing about infants with sleep apnea is that as their bodies grow and develop, the sleep apnea also goes away, making it a temporary issue.

Sleep apnea in kids

As for pediatric sleep apnea, it usually comes in the form of obstructive sleep apnea. The most common cause are enlarged or inflamed tonsils and adenoids. Obesity also plays some role.

When it comes to kids, the signs and symptoms of sleep apnea are not just limited to snoring and pauses in breathing. You should also look out for:

Snorting, coughing or choking while sleeping
Bed wetting
Restless sleep and frequent bad dreams
Poor performance in school
Difficulty in paying attention or focusing
Poor weight gain or weight loss
Behavioral problems

When it comes to kids, it’s not just an issue of waiting for the brain or the body to further develop. In some cases, doctors may recommend surgery and other forms of treatment to make your child better.

If left untreated, sleep apnea in children may lead to growth problems, heart problems, and even death.

Sleep apnea in adults

In adults, both forms of sleep apnea are common.

Here are some of the risk factors involved for obstructive sleep apnea in adults:

Obesity or excess weight – Having an excess amount of fat around the neck or throat can become an obstruction to proper breathing.
Neck size – Most people who have thicker necks than others often have narrower airways.
Narrow airways – The airways can be narrower because of inflammation, or when the tonsils and adenoids and enlarged. Some people also inherited their parents’ narrow airways.
Gender – Men are found to be twice or thrice as likely to have sleep apnea compared to women. The risk in women only rises if they’re overweight.
Age – The risk of sleep apnea in men rises as they get older, especially when they reach middle age and beyond. As for women, the risk increases after menopause.
Family history – The risk of having sleep apnea rises if most people in your family have it.
Use of sedatives, alcohol, etc. – If you drink alcohol or take any form of sedatives before sleeping, your tongue and throat muscles relaxes, making your tissues collapse against your airways. This forms an obstruction as you breath in and out while sleeping.
Smoking – Smokers are 3 times more likely to have sleep apnea because the habit causes inflammation around the airways.
Nasal congestion – Nasal congestion can come in the form of inflammation, or of any abnormality in your nasal passages.

As for central sleep apnea in adults, these are the risk factors involved:

Age – Middle-aged and older people are more at risk of having central sleep apnea.
Gender – As in the case of obstructive sleep apnea, men are more likely to have central sleep apnea than women.
Heart disorders – Those who have congestive heart failure are more likely to have central sleep apnea than those with healthier hearts.
Stroke – People who have had a stroke before are more likely to have central sleep apnea as a long-term effect.
Drinking narcotic pain medications – Opioids, methadone, and other similar medication can cause central sleep apnea.

Health Risks for People with Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea is sometimes one of the after-effects of different medical conditions. But the situation can also be reversed. Sleep apnea, in itself, can also lead to different health concerns and complications.

Here are just some of the potential health risks for people with sleep apnea:

High blood pressure

High blood pressure is one of the potential complications you may experience when you have sleep apnea. For those who already have high blood pressure, their condition may worsen.

You see, people with sleep apnea wake up several times throughout the night as their brains try to revive them during periods that they are unable to breathe. Most of the time, the person with sleep apnea does not remember waking up, but their bodies take the toll from these restless nights.

The body becomes stressed because it is unable to rest properly, which pushes your blood pressure levels to go higher. The oxygen level in your blood also drops, which adds even more fuel to the fire.

If you already have high blood pressure and suspect that you have sleep apnea, consult a doctor. Fixing your sleep apnea could be one of the driving factors of your high blood pressure, and getting treated for it could also eliminate or lessen your blood pressure problems.

Heart disease

The low levels of oxygen in the body and the frequent waking up in the middle of the night does not just cause your blood pressure to shoot up. It also causes your heart to go haywire.

Because sleep apnea disrupts the way that oxygen flows into your body, it makes it hard for your brain to control the amount of blood that goes through your arteries, and into the brain itself.

Aside from increasing the likelihood of a heart attack, sleep apnea can also cause you to have atrial fibrillation, which is characterized by fast and fluttering heartbeats.

Type 2 diabetes

When your body lacks rest, it is unable to use insulin properly. And when you have sleep apnea, your body is unable to rest well during the night simply because your system attempts to wake you up each time you stop breathing. This is also why people with sleep apnea often wake up still feeling tired.

Basically, the sleep apnea alters your glucose metabolism, promoting insulin resistance, which is what happens when you have type 2 diabetes.

Liver disease

Obstructive sleep apnea and the low levels of oxygen during nighttime results to oxidative stress. This then contributes to the progression of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease not only in adults, but in children as well.

This is why most people with sleep apnea show abnormalities when they go through liver function tests.

Complications with surgery and medications

People with sleep apnea are already to prone to breathing problems as it is. So just imagine how higher the risks are when they’re lying on their backs during surgery, heavily sedated.

This is why if you have sleep apnea and are scheduled to go through surgery, make sure you inform your doctor so that they can make the necessary adjustments.