There are many disorders of sleep, and each is associated with it's own unique symptoms and treatments. Most sleep disorder symptoms fall into one of two general categories: being sleepy when you want to be awake and difficulty falling or staying asleep. Millions of men and women, old and young, thin and overweight, suffer from disorders of sleep. Common sleep disorders include insomnia, sleep apnea, snoring, narcolepsy, and restless leg syndrome.
Obstructive sleep apnea, or OSA, is a condition in which breathing repeatedly stops during sleep, sometimes hundreds of times per night. This happens in some people because the throat, the passageway through which air travels on its way to the lungs, can narrow or even completely collapse during sleep.
Whether or not sleep apnea is dangerous depends on how severe the condition is. In its most mild forms, sleep apnea prevents us from reaching deep uninterrupted sleep. The result is a rest period that is poor both in quality and in quantity. As the degree and severity of sleep apnea increase, the physiologic effects on the body can also increase. Worsening sleep apnea can lead to severe reductions in oxygen levels, and increased levels of stress hormones in the blood stream. Untreated sleep apnea is now identified as a contributing cause of hypertension, heart attack, insulin resistance, and stroke.
A sleep diagnostic center is a medical facility at which testing for sleep disorders takes place. Tower Sleep Medicine is a state of the art facility located in the Cedars-Sinai Medical Office Towers. The center itself is comprised of private, sound insulated bedrooms, each equipped with digital diagnostic equipment that records breathing, heart function, oxygen levels, and brain waves. A trained sleep study technician performs the study under the supervision of our board certified sleep medicine physician specialist. This individual will be monitoring you in a separate control room, and will be on hand all night to answer any questions or address any problems.
Upon arrival at the facility, you will be greeted by the sleep technician, and taken to your private sleep testing room. There, the technician will explain the sleep study process, answer any remaining questions, and proceed with the "hook up". The hook up is a completely painless process during which tiny sensors are placed on your body. These specialized sensors monitor everything from brain waves, to heart rhythm, to arm and leg movements. Our physician specialist will then read and interpret the overnight recordings and discuss them with you.
This is one of the most common questions asked by prospective sleep center patients. The answer is that the vast majority of patients sleep just fine! A sleep study is intended to identify abnormalities in sleep. Even a relatively small amount of sleep, as little as two or three hours, is usually sufficient for the purposes of the test.