Friday, October 17, 2008

Are Your Children At Risk of Obstructive Sleep Apnea?

According to insomnia study, Obstructive Sleep Apnea is a pause of breath lasting ten seconds or longer during sleep. Sleep apnea is usually associated with snoring. The snoring proceeds at a regular pace for a period of time, often becoming louder, but is then interrupted by a long silent period with no breathing (apnea).

Sleep apnea can be caused by either complete obstruction of the airway (obstructive apnea) or partial obstruction (obstructive hypopnea—hypopnea is slow, shallow breathing)

Beside adult, now even our young kids are suffering from Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). How can we tell if a kids suffering from OSA, a tell tale is habitual snoring.

Children with OSA can actually stop breathing from a few seconds to as long as a few
minutes in their sleep. The oxygen level during this period will drop.

Although adult also suffer from OSA but children will be more dangerous because their brain is still developing. If OSA is not detected and treated early, it can lead to poor growth, delay in development, poorer academic development, as well as behavioral disorders.

OSA increase among young kids can be attributed to diseases such as asthma, allergic rhinitis and obesity. Obesity can cause excess fatty tissue to narrow the sides of airway, causing breathing obstruction.

The main cause of obstruction in breathing is the tonsils and adenoids. Adenoids is a mass of tissue located in the back of the nose. Therefore surgery of take out tonsils and adenoids is one of the insomnia treatment often used to treat OSA.

However, not many OSA in children is easily diagnosed as children may not snore as loudly as adults. Parents may not noticed as they are also sleeping at that time. If a family members snores, they might think snoring in children is also normal.

Hence now the other way to diagnosed OSA in children is through his sleeping position.
A child who has difficulty breathing may sleep in unusual sleeping position such as sitting up to sleep. Parents should be more observant on their children sleeping pattern in order to diagnosed OSA in children at early stage.