Sleep Apnea – A Sleeping Epidemic

This is for an overweight (30 bmi) teenager, who one year before weighed less than 80 pounds. (One last question: couldn’t losing weight fix the problem?)
Here’s a synopsis of the report:
Respiratory:
Total central apneas: 89
Total hypopneas: 98
Mean duration of apneas: 8.1 seconds
Longest apnea: 14.6 seconds

Apnea-Hypopnea Index (AHI): 27.5 events/hour
AHI during stage REM sleep: 33.5 events/hour
AHI in the supine position: 66.5 events/hour

Oxygenation: (I *think* all this part is good … right? wrong?)
Mean SpO2: 95%
Time spent with saturations less than 88%: 0.6% of total sleep time.
End tidal CO2 showed no significant hypoventilation.

Conclusions:
1) Patient had evidence of severe central sleep apnea, with an AHI of 27.5 events/hour an an SpO2 nadir of 80%
2) The patient’s sleep-disordered breathing was slightly wore in stage REM sleep and significanty worse in the supine positition.
3) The patient had abnormal sleep architecture.
RECOMMENDATIONS
1) Consider adenotonsillectomy to treat the obstructive component
2) Follow-up 6-8 weeks post surgery to assess clinical response
3) Consider MRI of brain and brain stem if central apneas persist
(*I DON’T GET WHY THEY WOULDN’T AUTOMATICALLY STILL GET MRI DONE. ANY IDEA?)

I would love to hear other people’s thoughts here on this. This is very new to me Funny thing is, I didn’t think the study was going to reveal much, so to hear all this is very confusing. Please feel free to give me your thoughts and suggestions. Thank you!

An adenotonsilectomy will do nothing for central sleep apnea. Central sleep apnea is when you repeatedly stop breathing during sleep because the brain temporarily stops sending signals to the muscles that control breathing. So there is nothing blocking or obstructing the airway.

Some types of central sleep apnea are treated with drugs that stimulate breathing. Patients should avoid the use of any sedative medications. If central sleep apnea is due to heart failure, the goal is to treat the heart failure itself.

MRI: The doctor reading the study would not "order" you to get an MRI because an MRI can be really expensive. If he ordered you to do it and it came up negative or inconclusive, you could file a lawsuit to have him (the ordering doctor) to pay for it because he told you to get an unnecessary test. So doctors use language like "consider" or "recommend".

•Describe the pathology that differentiates primary and secondary central sleep apnea and hypoventilation syndromes

Read this article that puts more light on the causes and treatment of sleep apnea: http://isleepbetter.com/sleeping-disorders/sleep-apnea-causes-and-treatment

I have been recently diagnosed with both obstructive and central sleep apnea (mostly central) and I would really like to know if anyone out there can give me some of the causes. I am 19 years old, did cross country and track intensely in high school (so I think I am healthy?), and probably may have had sleep apnea for about 4 years now. My dad snores a lot and I am definitely not overweight. I just want to know if anyone has heard of a similar case because I would really like answers since I just want to sleep already 🙁 By the way, I am not getting my CPAP until next week because my sleep doctor is looking the results from my second sleep study in regards to the central sleep apnea. Answers will be greatly appreciated!!

Central sleep apnea is when you repeatedly stop breathing during sleep because the brain temporarily stops sending signals to the muscles that control breathing.
Obstructive sleep apnea is a condition in which the flow of air pauses or decreases during breathing while you are asleep because the airway has become narrowed, blocked, or floppy.
A pause in breathing is called an apnea episode. A decrease in airflow during breathing is called a hypopnea episode. Almost everyone has brief apnea episodes while they sleep.