When should snoring be treated?

I snore regularly and feel very tired when I wake up. Do I need snoring treatment? (Hung, 30 years old, Quang Ninh).

Reply:

When we sleep, the tissues in the throat, the muscles in the palate, and the tongue will relax, pressing on part of the airway and vibrating, causing snoring. The narrower the airway, the more the air flow vibrates, making the snoring louder.

Almost everyone snores occasionally. If snoring is infrequent, no treatment is needed. In cases where snoring occurs frequently and affects health, it can be a sign of a medical condition. One of the most common and dangerous diseases in people who snore is sleep apnea.

People with sleep apnea often snore loudly with gasping for breath, causing sudden awakening. Patients often feel tired, have headaches when waking up, have difficulty concentrating, and feel sleepy during the day, which poses many risks of causing work accidents, traffic accidents, and household accidents.

If you have the above symptoms, you should go to a respiratory medical facility for examination. Here, the doctor will conduct a polysomnography or respiratory polygraphy to diagnose sleep apnea syndrome. If you do not have sleep apnea syndrome (ie just simple snoring) or have mild sleep apnea, you only need to change your lifestyle to reduce symptoms, by some ways such as losing weight (if overweight), exercising regularly, limiting alcohol, coffee, stimulants a few hours before going to bed; quit smoking, sleeping on your side, avoiding sedatives such as anti-anxiety drugs or sleeping pills. If you have nasal congestion or allergic rhinitis, you need to treat it with oral medications or topical sprays to clear the nose, thereby also reducing apnea episodes.

If lifestyle changes are not effective or the apnea is moderate to severe, your doctor may recommend other treatments. The most effective and valuable method today is continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). The patient wears a mask that covers the nose or both the nose and mouth, and the ventilator will create a continuous air pressure that is pushed in just enough to keep the upper airway open, thereby preventing apnea episodes. In addition, depending on the condition, your doctor may recommend other treatments such as: placing a jaw thrust device or tonsillectomy, adenoidectomy or velopharyngeal surgery, etc.

At Tam Anh General Hospital, CPAP breathing method has been successfully applied, which can improve 90% of snoring symptoms. The machine has a remote monitoring mode, helping doctors know how the patient is breathing at home, how effective it is or what difficulties the patient is having with CPAP breathing, thereby making appropriate adjustments. Using CPAP breathing machine helps patients reduce snoring, sleep well, prevent dangerous complications of sleep apnea, improve sleep quality, and improve quality of life.

Obstructive sleep apnea is a serious medical condition. If left untreated, it increases the risk of many dangerous cardiovascular diseases such as atrial fibrillation, myocardial infarction, uncontrolled high blood pressure, and even sudden death.

Master, Doctor Phung Thi Thom
Respiratory Department, Tam Anh General Hospital, Hanoi

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