{"id":15751,"date":"2021-02-24T03:08:00","date_gmt":"2021-02-24T03:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/squad\/?p=15751"},"modified":"2021-02-24T03:08:00","modified_gmt":"2021-02-24T03:08:00","slug":"the-effects-of-sleep-apnea-on-a-mans-brain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/sleep\/the-effects-of-sleep-apnea-on-a-mans-brain\/","title":{"rendered":"The Effects of Sleep Apnea on a Man\u2019s Brain"},"content":{"rendered":"

One billion people worldwide suffer from obstructive sleep apnea, and scientists are now investigating this disease and its relationship to people\u2019s brains. Although sleep apnea is annoying enough, with men waking up many times an hour and unable to get deep sleep, new research is showing that having obstructive sleep apnea could cause long term cognitive problems such as dementia or Alzheimer\u2019s disease.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Dementia and Sleep Apnea<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Dementia is a form of memory, judgment,\u00a0 and language loss brought about in old age that interferes with daily life. <\/span>Research shows <\/span><\/a>that \u201csevere OSA is linked to an increase in a protein, called beta-amyloid, that builds up on the walls of the arteries in the brain and increases the risk of dementia.\u201d People who have obstructive sleep apnea do not sleep very efficiently, and they rarely make it to the state of truly regenerative sleep. This causes the protein beta-amyloid to build up, and leaves these people more susceptible to dementia later on in life.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Alzheimer\u2019s and Sleep Apnea<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Alzheimer\u2019s disease is a type of dementia that affects many older people. Approximately <\/span>70% of people<\/span><\/a> with dementia have Alzheimer’s, so this is a very important part of dementia study.\u00a0 Recently, scientists have found a link between the plaque build up in patients with obstructive sleep apnea that is the same as the plaque build up in patients with Alzheimer\u2019s disease. They knew the two were related, but until now they did not have conclusive evidence of how, <\/span>Amyloid plaques show similar signs of damage<\/span><\/a>, in obstructive sleep apnea and Alzheimer’s, including where it starts and how it spreads. These signs make a definitive connection between OSA and Alzheimer\u2019s.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Ramifications of Studies<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Scientists have found that CPAP therapy, which is used to help sleep apnea patients get a full night of sleep, makes no difference to plaque build up. This begs the question of what can be done to stop or reverse the consequences of the build up of beta-amyloids in the brain. Scientists will continue to study these connections and possible therapies or cures that could reverse the loss of memory, judgment and language loss that affects so many.<\/span><\/p>\n

Time will tell what the scientific community can do to assist with deteriorating brains. The study of the interesting connection between sleep apnea, dementia, and Alzeimer\u2019s is still in its early stages, but should prove fruitful and helpful to suffering patients in the coming years. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One billion people worldwide suffer from obstructive sleep apnea, and scientists are now investigating this disease and its relationship to people\u2019s brains. Although sleep apnea is annoying enough, with men waking up many times an hour and unable to get deep sleep, new research is showing that having obstructive sleep apnea could cause long term […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15814,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[692],"tags":[837,693,1114],"class_list":["post-15751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sleep","tag-brain","tag-sleep","tag-sleep-apnea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15751\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healthymale.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}