Treating my Sleep Apnea
Here is a bookmark list of resources I found helpful while researching and evaluating the Vivos DNA/mRNA appliance for treating my obstructive sleep apnea. It is undoubtedly incomplete but it’s a good staring point: Some of the links will lead you to lots of further information.
After doing a lot of research into palate expansion options to treat my obstructive sleep apnea, I’ve decided to go with the Vivos DNA appliance. Actually, I’m getting the mRNA version which also advances and expands the lower jaw. This should give me more tongue space in my mouth, stop it blocking my airway and get me off my CPAP machine earlier.
Several dentists trained in dental sleep medicine, an othrodontist and a couple of ENTs have told me that I have underdeveloped jaws and a retrognathic maxilla as a result of the orthodontic extractions and retractive braces that I had when I was aged 13. This has left too little space in my mouth for my tongue, which collapses into my airway when I sleep. The condition is compounded by the gradual loss of muscle tone in my airway as I have aged and probably lead to my chronic fatigue developing at age 40, but it’s likely to have been affecting me most of my life. (more…)
Last Updated: 10 December 2022.
When I asked the sleep specialist who diagnosed me with severe obstructive sleep apnea what the cause of my condition was, he said that the muscles in my airway collapse during sleep. The Mayo Clinic, WebMD and Healthline all agree, but in my mind this doesn’t really identify the root cause. So I asked why my airway was too small to tolerate the collapse of the muscles in it, and he replied with: genetics.
I thought that sounded a bit odd given that neither of my parents suffered from obstructive sleep apnea, and as far as I was aware we had no family history of it. One of my siblings has since been diagnosed with it, at least one cousin has it, and I’m pretty sure my mother had it before she died but I wasn’t successful in getting her tested. Nevertheless, at the time I was determined to take my root cause analysis further because I thought that knowing the underlying cause would better inform me as to what the best treatment for the condition might be.
Several dentists, a world-renowned orthodontist and a sleep scientist have all told me that the tooth extractions and retractive orthodontic work I had done at age 13 is the likely cause of my underdeveloped jaws and resulting obstructive sleep apnea. It has left inadequate space in my mouth for my tongue which has nowhere to go during sleep but backwards, blocking my airway. I now believe this is what has devastated my health, caused my chronic fatigue and profoundly impacted my life over the last 12 years, and perhaps even longer.
However, the connection between orthodontic extractions and obstructive sleep apnea is apparently controversial amongst orthodontists. I had no idea that I had sleep apnea until it was diagnosed a couple of years ago after a polysomnograph that my sleep specialist almost didn’t recommend given my lack of recognised risk factors. It seems that sleep specialists are also unaware that orthodontic extractions are a risk factor for obstructive sleep apnea.
I’ve just passed seven months using CPAP, so here’s an update. It took a while for my nose to stop hurting when I first started using it, and fortunately Chris Kelly from AER Healthcare recommended I try paw paw ointment, which turned out to be a lifesaver. As a result, my compliance over the period has been over 98%. Here’s my AHI overview during that time as reported by OSCAR:
My AHI results using CPAP for 7 months
Relevant quotes from scientific papers as of 28 December 2019.
The studies below indicate that palate expansion usually improves nasal airway resistance.
Since palate expansion has historically only been successful with children or young adolescents, most of the studies are on them. SARME, MARPE and DOME have made palate expansion possible in adults but there are less studies available as the techniques haven’t been in use anywhere near as long. The studies that are available indicate that even mature adults can derive similar improvements in nasal airway resistance to those historically documented in children. (more…)
I had another appointment with my sleep specialist this week, so I wrote him a one-page summary of all the conventional treatments I’ve been exploring in the hope of curing my obstructive sleep apnea.
Here are the main points: (more…)
I’ve spent the last few weeks actively researching surgical, orthodontic and dental treatments for obstructive sleep apnea and visiting a lot of specialists to fully explore my options. I have underdeveloped jaws and nasal obstruction causing severe sleep apnea, possibly the result of extraction/retraction orthodontic work done when I was 13.
I visited orthodontist Derek Mahony recently who referred me to an ENT surgeon to investigate Maxillomandibular Advancement (MMA) surgery and Distraction Osteogenesis Maxillary Expansion (DOME). The success rate is high but it looks nasty. Derek said I would need 12 months of braces before the surgery, and I would need to be on CPAP in the meantime; so no matter what I do I realised I need CPAP to stay alive while I’m getting a permanent treatment sorted out. I’ve been on it for about a month and I’m hoping my general health will improve while I explore my options to expand my jaws and sleep naturally again.
I first came across Dan Neuffer, the author of the ANS Rewire Program, in 2012 after watching some of the videos on his CFS Unravelled YouTube channel. At the time, I had been desperately ill for almost 5 years and wasn’t getting any helpful response from my doctors. They just didn’t seem to know what was wrong with me. I checked out Dan’s CFS Unravelled website, read his free e-Book Discover Hope, and sent him an email to thank him for putting the information out there.
It’s exactly ten years to the day since I started this blog. Oh my god, that’s a fucking long time to feel like shit every minute of every day. I’m so angry about the whole thing, there aren’t even words to describe it.
Fortunately, there is some hope on the horizon for me, so I channel that anger into action that will hopefully restore my health. It’s also just over 12 months since I was diagnosed with severe obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), which I now suspect is the cause of my malaise. It turns out that getting a really good nights sleep is incredibly important for your long-term health. The symptoms of CFS and sleep apnea are both like an extreme version of what athletes experience when they overtrain, the common link being that the body isn’t getting sufficient chance to repair itself. (more…)