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Re: Anxiety or sleep apnea?

Posted by Richard on January 08, 1998 at 11:49:54:

In Reply to: Re: Anxiety or sleep apnea? posted by Greg Bierman on January 06, 1998 at 17:49:33:

I had explored the relationship between sleep apnea and nightime anxiety attacks with my sleep medicine practioner because of my wife's medical history. She has had a long-time history of anxiety attacks, especially at night, treated fairly successfully with Klonopin. She also shows signs of OSA including snoring and daytime drowsiness. Unfortunately her distrust of doctors in general and medical procedures that are threatening to her have prcluded her getting a sleep study done.

Anyhow, my sleep medicine physician told me that the two problems , OSA and anxiety attacks can be closely related. There is a psychological component when you wake up gasping for breath and feeling like you're choking that can induce a mental trigger causing panic. There are also physiological (blood Ph, lactic acid accumulation) and hormonal (mainly adrenaline) changes that can also serve as a trigger to panic attacks. I am just a fairly well-informed (graduate courses in nutrition, biochemistry, etc.) "civilian" so don't necessarily take my word for it.

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