Common Substance Cures Sleep Apnea

The most widely recognized treatments for obstructive sleep apnea are continuous positive airway pressure and dental devices.

But as these require you to sleep with facial masks or devices in your mouth, most people don’t stick to the treatment.

However, a study recently published in the journal Sleep reveals a pill – already approved by the FDA – drastically improves, or even cures, sleep apnea.

And if you don’t like prescription drugs, there is another “gray area” substance that has the same ingredients.

The researchers gave 70 people with moderate or severe sleep apnea either 2.5 mg of dronabinol (I’ll explain in a second what that is), 10 mg of dronabinol, or a fake treatment (placebo) every day, one hour before bedtime.

Their sleep apnea was tested at the beginning of the study and again after six weeks of treatment.

To measure this, the scientists obtained their subject’s scores on the apnea-hypopnea index, the Epworth Sleepiness Scale, and the maintenance of wakefulness test.

Compared to those receiving the placebo, the apnea-hypopnea index scores improved significantly, by 10.7 points for those receiving 2.5 mg and by 12.9 points for those receiving 10 mg.

The Epworth Sleepiness Scale scores of those receiving 10 mg dropped (improved) by 2.3 points compared with the scores of those receiving the placebo.

The 10 mg group also reported the highest satisfaction with the treatment of all groups.

Now, what exactly is dronabinol?

Dronabinol is an artificially made version of the psychoactive substance in marijuana called trans-delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).

Since the American government and its Food and Drug Administration have never been enthusiastic about approving marijuana as a medical treatment, but could simultaneously not deny the scientific research behind THC as a treatment for chemotherapy-induced nausea and anorexia brought about by cancer or AIDS, they authorized a synthetic version for these conditions.

This study has not tested THC itself, as it would most likely have run into regulatory problems. This makes it difficult to conclude confidently that natural marijuana would have worked but, as many users of the drug seemed to have noted, the synthetic version causes a “high” similar to that of marijuana, and since the side-effects on the label are identical to those of marijuana, it is probably not terribly different.

But if you don’t want drugs of any kind, or better yet, if you want to completely CURE your sleep apnea as soon as tonight, then try the simple 3-minute throat, jaw and tongue exercises found here…