Sleep Apnea Depletes This Essential Vitamin

Sleep apnea is a life-threatening disease. It has, for example, been linked to an increased risk of stroke and heart attack.

And for a long time, scientists believed it was the lack of oxygen intake while sleeping that caused these secondary diseases.

But a new study published in the journal Sleep Breathing Physiology and Disorders reveals that untreated sleep apnea depletes you of an essential vitamin. And this may be one of the biggest risk factors of sleep apnea.

Greek scientists decided to investigate not only whether sleep apnea sufferers have lower vitamin D levels than healthy sleep-breathers have, but also whether the most common sleep apnea treatment could increase vitamin D.

They recruited 30 people with sleep apnea and 30 healthy controls.

They first measured their subjects’ serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25(OH)D) levels, which is the form in which our bodies store vitamin D. They measured these levels at the beginning of the study and again after 3 and 12 months of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) treatment.

The subjects with sleep apnea were divided according to how well they adhered to their CPAP treatment. At least four hours of use for at least 70 percent of nights counted as good adherence.

Subjects who followed their CPAP program experienced a smaller drop in vitamin D levels than those who used the treatment inadequately over 12 months.

This association was so strong that they could use it to predict the vitamin D levels of the sleep apnea sufferers over 12 months.

Low levels of vitamin D have been associated with a long list of diseases. It has been proven to worsen arthritis and increase blood pressure and heart plaque buildup, leading to stroke and heart attack.

Therefore, if you suffer sleep apnea, it’s wise to spend extra time in the sun and supplement with vitamin D. We don’t know if it will improve sleep apnea but it will at least help reduce the damage it causes.

But of course, the best thing to do is to cure your sleep apnea. And the easiest (only) way to do that is to train your throat to stay open during the night using the simple throat exercises explained here…