Sleep Apnea And Dementia Patients

Sleep apnea may be particularly prevalent in people with alzheimer s disease with some estimates as high as 70 to 80 percent. The interruptions can happen 10 or more times an hour and are quite common in older adults exacerbating or sometimes mimicking dementia symptoms.

Understanding Alzheimer S Disease Chart 20x26 Dementia

Dementia patients often exhibit the symptoms of sleep apnea such as chronic snoring and or temporary loss of breath during sleep.

Sleep apnea and dementia patients. What is sleep apnea. But today s findings suggest that sleep disordered breathing leads to a buildup of a key marker for alzheimer s. People with sleep apnea have been shown not only to have impaired memory and executive function but also biomarker changes that are associated with alzheimer s disease.

Association of obstructive sleep apnea risk factors with nocturnal enuresis in postmenopausal women. For a number of reasons patients with dementia often have disturbed sleep. Sleep apnea an abnormal breathing pattern in which people briefly stop breathing many times a night resulting in poor sleep quality for sleep changes due primarily to alzheimer s disease there are non drug and drug approaches to treatment.

Research indicates that dementia and sleep have this type of bidirectional or bidimensional association. 10 1097 gme 0000000000000517 pmc free article lavie l. Earlier research has shown that elderly patients with alzheimer s disease suffered more severe symptoms from sleep apnea including frequent awakenings than sleep apnea patients without dementia.

Many elderly patients suffer from undiagnosed apnea drug interactions and excessive drug use or dependence. Sleep problems should be evaluated in all patients. Elderly women who suffer from sleep apnea characterized by disrupted breathing and sleep and a reduction in the intake of oxygen are about twice as likely to develop dementia in the next five years as those without the condition according to a multi center study led by researchers from the university of california san francisco.

Sleep apnea which means failure to breathe during sleep can be obstructive or non obstructive. Depression may be mistaken for dementia as may the effects of certain medications malnutrition and alcohol abuse. Even though sleep apnea does not directly cause dementia the effects of sundowning and persistent hypoxic conditions can symptomatically amplify dementia.

Implications to the heart and brain. The link between apnea not breathing hypopnea under breathing and dementia had been identified before with age being the most common explanation because the sleep breathing problems tend to strike older adults. Overnight sleep testing determined that the woman had obstructive sleep apnea nightlong interruptions in breathing that reduce oxygen flow to the brain and prevent deep sleep.

Many experts believe that sleep apnea is directly correlated to induction of severe dementia and vice versa. Sleep apnea is considered a risk factor for dementia. Those sleep disruptions may worsen symptoms and the progression of dementia and taking steps to better patient sleep may improve a patient s condition.

Oxidative stress in obstructive sleep apnea and intermittent hypoxia revisited the bad ugly and good.

Sleep Apnea May Raise Dementia Risk Study Finds Sleep Apnea