A restful night’s sleep is an essential part of good health. However, millions of Americans suffer from sleep disorders – conditions that disrupt or prevent sleep.
These disorders often go unrecognized, leading people to suffer needlessly when testing and effective treatment is readily available.
Some of these disorders can have a devastating impact on your life and serious health effects if not treated properly.
Do I have a sleep disorder?
If you or a loved one has one of the following signs, it may indicate a sleep disorder and should be evaluated by a physician:
- Habitual loud snoring, especially when associated with pauses or snorting noises
- Frequent brief choking, awakening with gasping or shortness of breath
- Awakening with a headache
- Persistent sleepiness when awake or episodes of falling asleep unintentionally
- Persistent fatigue
- Persistent difficulty falling or staying asleep
- An urge to keep moving the legs at bedtime or a rhythmic twitching of the legs after falling asleep
- Unusual behaviors during sleep such as sleepwalking
Common disorders
Listed below are some of the most common types of sleep disorders.
Treatment options
Our multidisciplinary approach offers the patients a more individualized treatment plan to improve a patient’s sleep. Our sleep experts manage sleep disorders with lifestyle changes, PAP machines, implantable devices, medication, behavior therapy or surgical management.
Frequently asked questions
Everyone has an occasional restless nights sleep. However, a continuous lack of quality sleep can adversely affect virtually every aspect of health. Poor sleep may reduce your ability to learn, think and pay attention to details. It can increase your risk of accidental injury while driving or operating machinery.
In addition, studies have shown that sleep is essential for the normal functioning of your body’s immune system and your ability to fight disease and sickness. Sleep is essential for you to function normally both physically and mentally.
The amount of sleep each person needs depends on many factors, including age. Infants generally require about 16 hours a day, while teenagers need about 9 hours on average.
For most adults, seven to eight hours a night appears to be the best amount of sleep, although some people may need as few as five hours or as many as 10 hours of sleep each day to feel fully refreshed.
Women in the first three months of pregnancy often need several more hours of sleep than usual. The amount of sleep a person needs also increases if he or she has been deprived of sleep in previous days.
Getting too little sleep creates a sleep debt, which is much like being overdrawn at a bank. Eventually, your body will demand that the debt be repaid. Our bodies do not seem to adapt to getting less sleep than we need.
Unfortunately, while we may get used to a sleep-deprived schedule day after day, our judgment, reaction time, and other functions are still impaired.
The Sleep Center evaluates patients referred by their primary care physician or another specialist. We also see self-referred patients. Many insurance companies, however, will require a referral from a primary care physician. You should contact your health insurance provider for the specific requirements for a specialist consultation and testing.
Most health insurance plans cover the consultation appointment and the sleep study testing, if indicated. You should contact your insurance company directly for specific details of coverage provisions.
Patients without insurance or desiring self-payment will be considered on a case by case basis. Payment plans will be arranged prior to appointments in these cases.
The sleep studies are not painful. You will have many electrodes pasted or taped to various parts of your body which may feel awkward and may cause some discomfort when trying to fall asleep. Most patients, however, are able to sleep comfortably during the testing.
Once your sleep specialist has determined continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) therapy is needed, an order will need to be written. Our dedicated Sleep Center staff will work with a Durable Medical Equipment (DME) company to fill the order for you CPAP machine and supplies. Once the order has been processed by the DME company and your insurance approves the request, you will be contacted by someone at the DME company to discuss billing set-up. They will also schedule an appointment with you for your equipment set-up. Most DME companies will come to your home or workplace, or you can go to one of their facilities.
During your initial set-up, the DME company will bring you your machine and all necessary supplies. They will educate you on how to turn on and off the machine. They will show you how to correctly put on your mask. They will show you all the components of your machine and supplies and how they function. They will also teach you how to care for your equipment. This process can take up to 5-7 business days.