A central Ohio man has become the first person in the United States to receive an implant being studied for the treatment of central sleep apnea in heart failure patients by delivering small electrical impulses during sleep to restore more natural breathing. The procedure was performed at The Ohio State University Medical Center’s Richard M. Ross Heart Hospital.

“After a successful proof-of-concept study at Ohio State and a small number of sites in China, Poland and Germany, the implant translates concept to reality,” says Dr. William Abraham, director of the division of cardiovascular medicine at Ohio State’s Medical Center, and principal investigator of the safety and feasibility trial. “The potential of this therapy is substantial, given the very high prevalence of central sleep apnea in heart failure patients.” Read the rest of this entry

Sleep apnea is a deadly sleep disorder that involves short periods of not breathing while sleeping. It is quite often associated with loud snoring, fatigue , daytime sleepiness. Popular traditional sleep apnea treatments are based on drugs, breathing machines, oral appliances and surgery. However, specific breathing exercises may also help overcoming sleep apnea.

Obstructive sleep apnea occurs when throat muscles relax, and central sleep apnea, when your brain does not properly signal the muscles that control breathing. Obstructive sleep apnea risk factors include excess weight, large neck circumference, hypertension, narrowed airway, smoking, or being male or over 65. The central type risk factors include stroke or brain tumor, heart problems, or being male or older.

The upper airway muscle function is involved in maintenance of the upper airway and contributes to obstructive sleep apnea syndrome, or OSAS. Researchers in Brazil studied it and published their findings in 2009 in the “American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

Thirty-one patients with moderate OSAS were divided into intervention and control groups. The intervention group performed a set of daily orophyaryngeal exercises involving the tongue, soft palate and lateral pharyngeal wall for three months.

Patients in the intervention group had a significant decrease in neck circumference, snoring intensity, daytime sleepiness and sleep quality. The researchers believe that these exercises, derived from speech therapy, may be an effective treatment option.

SleepApneaDisorder/[Press Release]/MINNEAPOLIS/ Jan. 22, 2011 / Cardiac Concepts, Inc. announced today the first U.S. clinical implant of the RespiCardia® System at The Ohio State University Medical Center, Columbus, Ohio. The RespiCardia System is a fully implantable device that is designed to restore more natural breathing patterns in patients with central sleep apnea, a sleep disorder characterized by a lack of respiratory effort by the diaphragm. The procedure was performed by Dr. Ralph Augostini, Assistant Professor of Clinical, Cardiovascular Medicine at The Ohio State University, on a 61 year old male patient with a history of central sleep apnea and atrial fibrillation.

This was the first U.S. implant in a global pilot study of this novel therapy for treating a large and growing health problem. “The first U.S. implant of the RespiCardia System brings concept to reality,” said William T. Abraham, M.D., Professor of Internal Medicine and Director of Cardiovascular Medicine at The Ohio State University. “The potential of this therapy is substantial, considering the very high prevalence of central sleep apnea in heart failure patients and in those with various neurological disorders.” It is estimated that approximately 35-40% of all heart failure patients have central sleep apnea. With the incidence of heart failure on the rise, there is even greater emphasis on diagnosing and treating this serious clinical problem. Read the rest of this entry

SleepApneaDisorder/[Press Release]/ Hanover Park, IL / January 21, 2011/ Dr. Jin Zhou, DC at PainUSA.com celebrates seventh year of Zhou’s Hypoxicology Therapy (ZHT) clinical research for possible solutions to more medical conditions than sleep apnea, such as resistant hypertension, due to the same possible causes: baroreflex dysfunctions and tracheal caudal displacement (TCD), coincidentally in the wake of latest world research findings on “Difficult to Treat or Resistant Hypertension: Etiology, Pathophysiology, and Innovative Therapies”, published this month in the volume 2011 of International Journal of Hypertension.

With obvious and satisfactory clinical benefits from ZHT in early clinical observations for sleep apnea and anecdotal benefits for hypertension, Dr. Zhou is clinically seeking for alternative solutions to sleep apnea and hypertension that are completely supernatural and most economical. Read the rest of this entry

If you’re not sleeping well, if your partner complains that you snore loudly or you’re finding yourself excessively tired and having trouble concentrating during the day, you may have sleep apnea. It’s a common disorder that should be diagnosed by a doctor.

The two most-often diagnosed types are obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea. If you have sleep apnea, chances are, you’ll be told you need to sleep with a continuous positive airway pressure machine, or CPAP.

Sleep apnea is usually adequately treated with a CPAP even if oxygen levels were quite low.

If you have obstructive sleep apnea, your upper airway collapses, either partially or completely, during sleep and the oxygen level of your blood is often low.  [Read The Complete Post By Lisa Shives, M.D. ]

Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder is defined by brief interruptions of breathing while you are asleep. This is a very serious condition, because it can result in high blood pressure, heart problems and stroke.

Signs and Symptoms of Sleep Apnea

The warning signs and symptoms of sleep apnea include: Read the rest of this entry

New York Harbor Healthcare System, Brooklyn campus, will officially open its state-of-the-art Sleep Center on Monday, Sept. 27, at 10 a.m.

Veterans of all ages can now be diagnosed and treated at VA for a wide variety of sleep disorders including obstructive sleep apnea, restless leg syndrome, central sleep apnea syndromes, narcolepsy, as well as sleep problems associated with traumatic brain injury.

The Sleep Center will conduct home sleep studies for sleep apnea testing. Sleep apnea is one of the leading causes of excessive daytime sleepiness, which often goes undiagnosed. [Read Complete Release...]

VirtuOx Inc, a medical technology services company that delivers home testing solutions, entered into an agreement with Watermark Medical, a company currently servicing the sleep-disordered breathing market, to utilize the Watermark ARES device in its portfolio, the VirtuOx Home Sleep Test (HoST) solutions.
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A recently research report on a patient with mental retardation and chronic hypercapnic respiratory failure who was found to have severe central apnea and periodic breathing while undergoing an evaluation of low oxygen saturation during wakefulness at rest has revealed that the Joubert syndrome is closely associated with severe central sleep apnea.

Magnetic resonance imaging of the brain, which was performed to uncover potential causes for the central sleep apnea, revealed a “molar tooth sign” consistent with the diagnosis of Joubert syndrome. Read the rest of this entry

One of the most common health disorders among people around the world is “sleep apnea”. In its simplest sense ‘sleep apnea’ can be understood as one or more pauses in normal breathing. In many cases the shallow breathing during sleep is also termed as ‘sleep apnea’.

A pause in normal breathing during sleep may have an undefined duration. Meaning thereby, the pause could be for a few seconds only or it can even stretch up to few minutes.

Similarly, the rate of occurrence of such pauses during sleep may also vary up to great ranges. It could be five times per hour or even up to 30 times an hour. Normal breathing generally starts immediately after such a pause but this re-start could generate a snoring or choking sound as well. Read the rest of this entry

Cardiac Concepts, Inc., a developer of medical devices to treat Heart Failure patients who experience breathing disturbances during sleep, announced today enrollment of the first European patients in a Pilot Clinical Trial.

The purpose of the Pilot Study is to understand the respiratory and cardiac benefits of the RespiCardia(TM) System when treating a breathing disorder known as Central Sleep Apnea (CSA) in Heart Failure patients. Prof. Piotr Ponikowski, Principal Investigator of the Pilot Clinical Trial at The Medical University/4th Military Hospital in Wroclaw, Poland, commented that the system was successfully implanted in 2 male patients, ages 57 and 68 years with ischemic cardiomyopathy and symptoms of moderate heart failure. Despite optimal medical management, both experienced severe sleep breathing disorders. The trial is a 40 patient study being conducted in a number of centers worldwide. Implants are expected to begin in the United States in the coming months. Read the rest of this entry