Apnea

Neighbors are living off the grid on Windsor Park Lane in Havertown, powerless since Hurricane Irene's Saturday slap plunged large portions of the region into the 19th century. There was no milk for the new baby on the block, and no rest for the car salesman with sleep apnea. "Power envy" was setting in. Fans couldn't catch the Phillies games they craved. Concerned calls from relatives went unanswered on dead phones. And nearly all the ice cream has melted. Like 47,000 other Peco Energy customers in the area and 75,000 folks in New Jersey, several households on Windsor Park Lane were still without power Tuesday.

As America's average girth has grown and surgery has proven a relatively effective treatment for obesity, procedures that reduce the size of the stomach have grown in popularity and acceptance. The American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery says that 200,000 Americans have weight-loss surgery each year. Besides helping people lose weight, the society says the surgery reduces the odds that they will die from cancer, heart disease or diabetes. In more than three-quarters of cases, surgery resolves or improves Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and sleep apnea, the group says.

The next time parents take their child for a medical checkup, they may be asked a new question: Does your child snore? The American Academy of Pediatrics is now urging its member doctors to include questions about snoring as a way of identifying children who may have a condition called obstructive sleep apnea syndrome. Sleep apnea is marked by breathing interruptions and sleep disturbances, and in children it has been linked to a host of problems including hyperactivity, attention and learning difficulties, slower growth, and high blood pressure.

Question: At the insistence of my husband (because of my loud snoring), I had a sleep study, which found that I have sleep apnea. I must admit I'm better rested in the morning using a CPAP mask. I always thought sleep apnea was a man's condition. How common is it in women? Answer: Obstructive sleep apnea, a condition in which patients' airways are obstructed many times during the night, is much more common in women than most folks would think. A recent Swedish study looked at 400 women from a population-based random sampling of 10,000 females between the ages of 20 and 70. Obstructive sleep apnea was found in 50 percent of the women who answered a questionnaire and underwent an overnight monitored sleep study.

For more than two years, my snoring kept Laura awake most nights. It often got so loud that she used earplugs and buried her head under a pillow to escape the din. Nothing worked, and we were both exhausted. I felt guilty for ruining her sleep, and I blamed her for disturbing mine when she roused me several times a night to shut me up. Now I no longer snore and we both sleep better. Each night for the last seven weeks, I have worn a breathing mask so air can be pumped through my nose and control my sleep apnea.

Fernando Bonanni, a surgeon at Abington Memorial Hospital, was disappointed to hear Tuesday about Gov. Christie's choice for weight-loss surgery. The governor admitted this week that he secretly had lap-band surgery in February. "He couldn't have picked a worse choice, unfortunately," said Bonanni, medical director of Abington's Institute for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery. "It's not that it's a bad surgery for everyone, but it's a bad surgery for him. " Bonanni said the procedure - installing a laparoscopic adjustable gastric band - is not ideal for "super-obese" patients like the governor.

Gene Wroblewski's rumbling snores kept his wife, Lorry, wide awake for years. In desperation, she finally sought refuge in a spare bedroom. Wroblewski, 67, of Doylestown, has sleep apnea, a serious medical condition characterized by loud snoring and pauses in breathing that last five to 60 seconds. About a month ago, he was fitted with a small dental device that has eased his breathing problem. Called a Herbst device after the German orthodontist who invented it, it was custom-made for Wroblewski by the Main Clinical Campus of Medical College Hospitals in Philadelphia.

Snoring is no laughing matter. In fact, says Dr. Armando A. Montiel of Marlton, it sometimes can be fatal. But, because the person who snores excessively often is unaware of it, it is usually a spouse who brings the patient to see the doctor. So when Montiel hears a wife say to her husband, "Honey, keep quiet and let me tell the doctor all about it," he knows exactly what to expect next. "She'll say, 'He scares me . . . he snores loudly and then he stops breathing. He's grouchy and moody during the day, and he falls asleep at the drop of a hat. " These, say Montiel, are the classic symptoms of sleep apnea, a disorder in which the patient has repeated episodes of excessive snoring followed by a cessation of breathing.

Safeguard Scientific Inc., Wayne, said today it invested $20 million in NovaSom, a provider of portable diagnostic equipment for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Safeguard's investment is the lead contribution in a total of $35 million that NovaSom received to fund growth. The Baltimore company's equipment allows patients to be tested for OSA at home instead of in a hospital. OSA is a condition in which a person has trouble breathing during sleep due to a blocked upper airway.

A few years ago, I took care of a child who changed the way I practice pediatrics. His case underscored the need to ask one key question. "Does your child snore?" The child was 3, with no real medical problems, except that he was overweight. His mother brought him into my office concerned about his persistent cough and mentioned that he was also short of breath more often when he ran around. To help him sleep, the woman added, she had to put two pillows under his head. A physical exam showed fluid in the lower parts of his lungs.