Many reach for a coffee, an energy drink or a soda when they miss a full night’s rest.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates 50 million to 70 million Americans do not sleep properly.
For Cortez resident Jim Perry, sleeping at night meant gasping for air, sometimes 13 times an hour because his brain would fail to prompt his lungs to breathe.
Many others – including Felix Monteagudo, the technical director of the Sleep Center at Southwest Memorial Hospital – struggle to breathe when their tongues and throats relax during the night, cutting off air supply.
These conditions exemplify two forms of sleep apnea, and as many as 10 percent of adults in the United States suffer from this disorder, said Dr. Ed Razma, the medical director of the sleep center.
As the medical understanding of the connection between sleep and other health factors – including blood pressure and weight – has grown, so has the ability to study and treat it in Cortez.
The sleep center became a permanent fixture at the hospital four years ago. The center sees about 200 patients a year.
When Monteagudo joined the staff in 2012, facilities were improved and expanded.
“We need to create more of a home environment,” he recalled telling the staff at the time.
To be diagnosed, a patient’s head, face, chest and other areas must be covered with sensors to monitor breathing, heart rate, body movement and other indicators.
He made it a priority to improve the two bedrooms used for the study by installing showers and televisions as well as taking steps to reduce noise and light to the rooms to make sleep easier to achieve during testing.
Monteagudo, who is a registered polysomnographic technologist, works with patients to help manage their symptoms. He brings a personal understanding to his work because he suffered with undiagnosed obstructive sleep apnea for many years. He knows exactly what patients are suffering with, including loss of memory and loud snoring.
“It’s not a joke anymore,” he said of snoring.
He was a respiratory therapist in 1996 when a position opened at the sleep center at the Florida hospital where he was working.
After learning about sleep apnea, it dawned on him: “I think I have this.”
Perry, who has central sleep apnea, appreciated the understanding and patience Monteagudo and other staff members brought to his case.
Perry was referred to the center by his primary care doctor, and he was determined to adjust to the treatment after learning his sleep apnea could lead to congestive heart failure.
He had to return three times for testing and struggled to sleep with the sensors.
Eventually, the clinic sent him home with a bilevel positive airway pressure machine, also known as a BIPAP, to prevent his breathless episodes starving him of oxygen for up to 42 seconds at a time. The machine uses positive air pressure to help keep his airways open.
He said it took months to get used to wearing a mask at night and to get used to the sound of the machine. But he has noticed a real difference in his energy level.
“I’m not having that terrible afternoon letdown,” he said.
As the understanding of Perry’s condition and the far more common obstructive sleep apnea has grown, so has the center’s ability to diagnose it.
In October, Cortez doctors started sending patients home with kits to test for obstructive apnea in their own beds.
At-home testing can cut the cost of testing by a third for patients, Monteagudo said.
“Insurance often drives the way we prescribe sleep testing,” Razma said.
However, at-home sleep testing is not as thorough as testing in the lab and does not pick up other conditions, he said. If doctors suspect a patient has a complex sleep disorder, he/she will require a test in the lab.
The center also is working to become accredited with the American Association of Sleep Medicine, he said.
