Sleep Apnea - Part 1

I was diagnosed with Sleep Apnea earlier this year. The Greek word "Apnea" means "without breath". Millions of Americans have sleep apnea, which means that they stop breathing several times during the night. There are several treatment options for sleep apnea, which I will talk about later. For more information about sleep apnea please visit this list of resource links posted by the American Sleep Apnea Association.

I first suspected that I had sleep apnea after a trip to Las Vegas with my daughter, Beth. We shared a hotel room, and she told me that I not only snore but I stop breathing during the night. So upon our return from Vegas I went to the doctor. My diagnostic and treatment adventure began about a week later.

The first step in the process was to have a sleep study. I went to a sleep diagnostic center in Century City. You are given a list of instructions, which includes things such as don't take a nap the day of the study, don't drink any caffeine the day of the study, things to make you insure that you will not have a difficult time falling asleep the night of the study. My appointment was scheduled from 10:30 p.m. and went until 6 a.m. The sleep testing center at first looks like a doctor's office. The testing room itself is like a hotel room. My room contained a bed, dresser, TV with VCR, and a couple of chairs. First you are instructed to get ready for bed and told that the technician will be with you shortly. A word of advice, wear comfortable pajamas - on my second sleep study I wore some tight exercise pants, and this made it difficult to put the wires on my legs.

When the technician comes in, the first step is to hook you up to about 20 wires to monitor you while you sleep. There are wires on your head (put on with a stiff lotion), your arms, your legs, your stomach and it is all hooked up to a machine named "Alice 5". The first half hour to an hour of the study you are monitored as you sleep. After that, you are awoken and the technician hooks you up to a machine called a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP). You are then monitored with this device for the remainder of the night. The CPAP machine delivers air thru your nasal passage thru a mask. The first mask was difficult for me, because I breathe primarily through my mouth. I was then switched to a mask that covered both my nose and my mouth. The technician adjusted the air flow several times during the night.

The only difference between the testing room and a hotel room is that the bathroom is down the hall. Every time you want to go to the restroom you need to unplug the monitor and bring "Alice" with you. There is no shower at the facility.

About a week later I received a note from my doctor's office that I needed to schedule a second sleep study. It had been determined that I had severe sleep apnea, but the first mask did not work for me, so they wanted to try a different type, Bi level Positive Airway Pressure (Bi PAP). Same drill as before, but the new mask was put on at the beginning of the night. After this sleep study, I received another note that I needed to see a doctor at the sleep diagnostic center. I called to schedule an appointment, and was told that I needed a referral from my doctor. HMOs - gotta love all that red tape! So I called and left a message for my doctor. My doctor was on vacation, so I was told that they would leave a note for another doctor to write up the referral. The next day, when I had heard back I called again. They took the message again and when I called later that day, they had referred me to an Ear, Nose, and Throat (ENT) doctor.