Posted on 08/02/2019 2:24:19 PM PDT by ConservativeMind
When someone is depressed and having suicidal thoughts or their depression treatment just isn't working, their caregivers might want to check to see if they have obstructive sleep apnea, investigators say.
That's true even when these individuals don't seem to fit the usual profile of obstructive sleep apnea, which includes males who are overweight, snore and complain of daytime sleepiness, says Dr. W. Vaughn McCall, chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Health Behavior at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University.
"No one is talking about evaluating for obstructive sleep apnea as a potential cause of treatment-resistant depression, which occurs in about 50 percent of patients with major depressive disorder," says McCall, corresponding author of the study in The Journal of Psychiatric Research. Now he hopes they will.
The investigators found clinically relevant disease in 14 percent of 125 adult patients with major depressive disorder, insomnia and suicidal thoughts, even though the sleep-wrecking apnea was an exclusion criterion for the original study.
Sleep apnea tends to produce excessive daytime sleepiness but this study was recruiting for patients with insomnia, and most with insomnia don't have sleep apnea, rather issues like anxiety, stress and depression and other emotional and psychological factors are more likely interfering with their sleep. Rather than complain of daytime sleepiness, females are more likely to say they are unable to fall asleep and stay asleep at night and are more likely to be depressed, McCall says.
(Excerpt) Read more at medicalxpress.com ...
The CPAP manufacturers are lobbying hard!
Not just “Obstructive Apnea.”
There is also a brain stem apnea where a person just stops breathing. It’s called “Central Apnea.”
When you have both it is “Complex Apnea.”
In the1970s I was depressed. I had previously slept equally on all 4 sides, left, right, stomach and back. I discovered that sleeping on my stomach increased my depression. Since then I have never slept on my stomach.
It didn’t cure me. I’ve learned to function with my depression. Sleep position helps. Mtn Dew helps. No other medicine I’ve found helps.
Twenty years ago I developed severe insomnia, almost overnight. The doctor diagnosed it as a symptom of depression and sent me to a shrink.
The shrink told me I couldn’t sleep because I was depressed. I told him I wasn’t depressed, and if I was it was because I couldn’t sleep.
I went and had a sleep study done. It showed I was stopping breathing some incredible amount of times per hour.
I always figured it was snake oil. However I got a CPAP about 6 month ago and went from waking up every 2 hours to sleeping through 6 to 8 hours.
Before, I’d wake at the 2 hour mark and HAVE to pee. Also I’d be very congested in the morning.
I can’t speak to the depression. Life still sucks. /Grin
CPAP has done a lot of good for me.
CPAP allowed me to have to best night’s sleep in 30 years. I would just stop breathing and wake up....over and over. It’s been a godsend for me.
They really don’t understand the cause of central apnea. There is a saying in medicine about spinal vertebrae..... break C4 and breathe no more.
Must have something to do with the brain stem area around c4.
When you wake up several times a night for no particular reason but not struggling to breathe, and you don’t get tired during the day despite only five to six hours of sleep, could that still be apnea?
I suffered with it for five years. Working in the natural modalities, I knew and tried many things. This is what worked for me:
1. Sleeping on my back with a good orthopedic pillow, to promote proper cervical curvature, to keep the breathing passageway open.
2. Becoming properly hydrated. Most people by age 30 are sub-clinically dehydrated. The thirst mechanism adapts by becoming dulled (reset downward).
The answer is Water + Salt.
Salt is essential, and has been unjustly demonized. Too much water without corresponding salt increase creates an osmotic imbalance.
A dash of salt placed on the tongue - which triggers biochemical responses in the brain and gut - is the key.
Fereydoon Batmanghelidj, M.D., wrote a series of books on this. The most known is, “Your Body’s Many Cries for Water.”
Websites: watercure.com. watercure2.org.
Although the media reports people dying from salt overdose, the actual clinical finding is dehydration. Ergo, water and salt balance each other; too much or little of either is bad.
Once I was properly hydrated, my lung’s alveoli were no longer becoming congested (by mucous, to protect the too-dry sensitive tissues). That, coupled with proper cervical support, took care of the problem.
I experienced improvement within 48-72 hours, and after 2+ weeks, I was recovered.
I am ever so grateful for my doctor recommending me for a CPAP.
I think much clearer, function better, have better muscle tone, and marvel of marvels, manage to sleep through the night without having to make multiple trips to the bathroom!
I literally laughed at her when she gave me the issues I was experiencing and how the CPAP may be help. She was thrilled with I went back several months later for a follow-up; it was like seeing a new patient!
I enjoy not feeling like a toddler unable to be potty-trained!
LOL
Yes.
You’re describing what I experienced in the early years.
Lack of sleep will eventually catch up to you.
Be safe and have it checked out.
Thank you for sharing that.
So many people are skeptical or think it’s too much hassle for the benefit.
I fear we have a lot of friends, families, and FReepers who really need a sleep study and a likely CPAP.
I don't understand the relationship: How does CPAP decrease urinary frequency?
I think the many apnea events were triggering the body to “wake up.”
Once awake, any feeling of the need to urinate was registering in the brain, so, off to the bathroom (repeated however many times nightly). Logical to think that waking up was the result of needing to urinate (and not from apnea events).
With CPAP, the person sleeps through soundly (few apnea events) and NOT waking up frequently. Normal bathroom trip in the morning after waking and getting up for the day.
That’s been my experience.
The simple version I got:
Your body is doing it’s best to *wake you up.* It’s one of the body’s ways of pulling out all the stops to get you awake enough to breathe again. It sounded silly to me at the time...
That said, the CPAP has truly been a blessing.
Some nights after exercising too closely to bedtime and not cooling down with stretches, I will fall asleep without my CPAP. I will wake thinking I will never make it to the bathroom. At least I know why, now, and don’t panic.
Also, headaches. I would wake up with headaches SO bad I would be like a little puppy and whine. As long as I’m using the CPAP those have gone down to almost nothing.
Folks using CPAP can really feel the difference if they have to go without their CPAP for a day or two.
I didn’t read down far enough to see your post, Skybird.
Isn’t it a wonderful luxury to be sleeping?
I count it as a blessing during my prayers.
In the morning, I absolutely relish knowing I’ve slept through the night.
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