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Sleep is one of the most necessary parts of our life cycle. Nowadays, sleep problems are general all over the world. According to the study, approximately there are one-third population has faced some sleep disorders frequently. They may suffer from insomnia, hypersomnia, narcolepsy, obstructive sleep apnea, etc.
People may have struggled with staying awake during the daytime because of excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS). There are many causes and many underlying diseases that affect sleep and cause excessive daytime sleepiness. Narcolepsy, hypersomnia, and insomnia are some of the reasons that cause EDS. Some daily habits, foods, routines also can cause sleep-related issues.
Now let’s look at how some diseases are linked with sleep.
Narcolepsy
In this sleep disorder, patients face excessive daytime sleepiness regularly. Narcolepsy is one type of neurological disorder where the sleep-wake cycle is not working well because of the brain. There are many symptoms of this disorder; daytime sleepiness, cataplexy, poor REM sleep, sleep paralysis, fragmented sleep, etc.
In the United States, there are approximately two lakhs of people who are suffering from narcolepsy.
During the night-time, people are not able to sleep continuously. They may wake up two or three times and, the next day, they feel so sleepy all day. Medications like Modalert and Modvigil are some of the best ways to improve daytime sleepiness in patients with narcolepsy. People may face this disorder at any age. Usually, this disorder can grow at the age of 7 to 25.
Restless legs syndrome
In restless legs syndrome (RLS), people face jerky legs movement frequently throughout the night. In this disorder, a patient’s legs have an unpleasant feeling of pain. Sometimes RLS can affect our different body parts too.
Symptoms of this disorder may get excessive or worsen while you are sleeping. Generally, these symptoms arrive at night-time and, these things lead you to excessive daytime sleepiness. However, these situations can handle in many ways, but your doctor’s suggestions help you the best. This thing can also cause you one of the worst conditions insomnia.
People can treat RLS with some iron and vitamin B-12 supplements, but takes this according to the doctor’s guidelines. There are also some medications that can help you to improve the symptoms of RLS. You can control these things by habits, such as not taking alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, etc.
Sleep apnea
Strange for many people because they are suffering from this but not aware of it. A patient may know this thing if he/she is sharing a bed with someone and that person tells them about these things.
Sleep apnea appears because of upper airway collapse for 5 to 10 seconds while a person was sleeping. It may happen again and again during sleep. These symptoms are the result of a blockage in the airway.
Central sleep apnea happens when the brain fails to send the signal to the muscles which control breathing. Sleep apnea also causes many other things such as heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, depression, fatigue, etc.
Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) is well known to improve the symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea. Additionally, you can also use the medications like Waklert or Artvigil to enhance wakefulness. If any of the options are not working, you can go for surgery to reduce this suffering.
Depression
Depression is characterized by persistent feelings of sadness, worry, and hopelessness. Other signs and symptoms include forgetfulness and attention issues, as well as a lack of energy. Activities that were once enjoyable are frequently no longer so. Back pain and stomach trouble are common physical symptoms of depression.
Sleep disturbances and drowsiness have a close connection to depression. It’s not always clear if depression causes sleep problems or depression causes sleep problems. Both may be true in some instances. Sleep disorders and depression may have similar risk factors and treatment options.
Depression can treat in many ways like medications, different therapies, lifestyle, habits, etc. Treatment of depression is dependent on which type of depression patients has.
Hypersomnia
It is a condition where a patient feels excessive daytime sleepiness and takes an extremely long period of sleep compared to natural sleep time. There are some health conditions that are the root cause of this, such as narcolepsy, epilepsy, Parkinson’s, depression, etc.
There are many ways to treat this type of excessive daytime sleepiness and, the medication for narcolepsy is one of the favourite choices of doctors.
Insomnia
Insomnia is one of the most common sleep disorders all over the world. It is a sleep disorder when a person isn’t able to get peaceful sleep continuously.
There are several causes that can trigger insomnia, such as stress, narcolepsy, caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, physical injuries, etc. The stresses of our routine life, life events, job stress, separation, or death of a loved one also cause insomnia.
It is hard to get control over sleep disorders. Sometimes the doctor may prescribe some safe sleeping pills for a short time. Sometimes sleeping pills make the situation worse, so they may prescribe other medication like modafinil or armodafinil to promote wakefulness.
Some lifestyles can also help you to improve these symptoms of excessive daytime sleepiness. You can avoid nicotine, alcohol, and caffeine because these things can prevent you from falling asleep.
You have to control your food habits because this thing also causes many sleep-related difficulties.
Lifestyle also matters with sleep.
Our routine lifestyle matters a lot to our sleep, and the surprising thing is that almost everyone is ignoring these simple things. Our wake-up time, food, working time, parties, and many more are related to sleep.
If a person works in different shifts, there is a greater chance of having sleeping difficulties. This thing is happening because that person is working against the natural life cycle. It is the big reason why almost all shift workers have some sleeping difficulties. They are the most who have excessive daytime sleepiness mostly.
The bottom line
There are countless things that can cause excessive daytime sleepiness. We must be aware of our health conditions; otherwise, we have to get ready to face some critical situations.
