Herbal Health

It is no coincidence that snoring only occurs during sleep. The very process of lying down introduces new forces on the contents of the chest wall and abdomen which, for the overweight patient, may interfere with the normal functioning of the diaphragm. Furthermore, and more significantly, there is a deterioration of the finely tuned muscular control of the upper airway during sleep. This loss of control, however, is not peculiar to snorers. Loss of tone, or hypotonia, is a feature of the human upper airway common to both snorers and non-snorers and in general, the effect is more pronounced in deeper sleep. For the purpose of studying sleep disorders, a system of sleep staging has been developed to avoid vague terms such as “light” and “deep” sleep. Each sleep stage is commonly defined by measuring the electrical activity of the brain (an electro-encephalogram or EEG), muscle tone, usually of the jaw (an electro-myogram or EMG) and eye movement (an electro-oculogram or EOG). There are two broadly defined sleep states: Rapid Eye Movement sleep (REM) and Non Rapid Eye Movement sleep (NREM), the latter being subdivided into stages 1, 2, 3 and 4. The progression from “light” to “deep” sleep corresponds with the progression from NREM 1 to NREM 4 and then to REM.

The sleep of a normal adult consists of variable sleep cycles with a gradual drifting from one sleep stage to another, but occasionally punctuated by abrupt changes from one level to another, such as stage 1 to REM and vice versa. The cycle is repeated several times a night with REM sleep occurring at approximately 90 minute intervals. During sleep, particularly during REM sleep, breathing patterns are different to that of the awake state. REM sleep is characterized by irregular breathing; at times fast and at other times slow. The combined effects of irregular breathing and minimal upper airway tone make this a critical period of sleep for snorers and for many with underlying lung disease.

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Tags: General Health

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