Sleep Apnea Treatment Could Boost Your Work Performance
Posted: April 14, 2022
Millions of Americans suffer from sleep apnea, which can have huge effects on health and everyday life. For example, sleep apnea can increase the risk for serious conditions like heart disease and diabetes. Sleep apnea can also cause symptoms that make it difficult to perform day-to-day activities. Research shows that those with sleep apnea may have poorer work performance and career growth if they do not get sleep apnea treatment for their symptoms. In this article, we’ll explore how sleep apnea affects work performance and how you can improve your productivity if you think you have sleep apnea.
Studies Suggest Sleep Apnea Treatment May Improve Work Performance
Sleep apnea treatment may help improve your work performance by helping you sleep better.
If you think you have sleep apnea, it’s important to start a sleep apnea treatment program to improve your health and reduce your symptoms. Recent research suggests that in addition to reducing some of the risks associated with sleep apnea, treatment with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) may also help improve your work performance. One study from 2010 looked at work productivity in people with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). The researchers found that those who started sleep apnea treatment with CPAP therapy had significantly higher productivity at work than those who didn’t. Those who used their CPAP device regularly also noticed they felt less sleepy during the workday after just three months of treatment.
Therefore, evidence suggests that sleep apnea can negatively affect your work performance. However, these negative impacts may be reversible by starting treatment for OSA. For instance, CPAP therapy is the gold standard for sleep apnea treatment and may help you improve your performance at work.
How Does Sleep Apnea Affect Your Career?
There are many ways that sleep apnea can negatively affect your career. Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder that causes you to stop breathing or breathe shallowly for seconds or minutes at a time as you sleep. These periods are called apnea events.
Those with mild sleep apnea may have between five and 15 apnea events per hour as they sleep. Moderate sleep apnea sufferers experience between 15 and 30 apnea events per hour. People with severe sleep apnea may have more than 30 apnea events every hour.
The problem with sleep apnea is that these pauses in breathing cause many issues with your sleep and overall health. Your body experiences a dip in oxygen levels and typically forces you to wake up and breathe. This puts your body in a constant state of stress and causes sleep fragmentation. Those with sleep apnea may have a harder time reaching deeper, more restorative levels of sleep, leading to sleep deprivation. Because of this, your neurons may become overworked and your physical and mental health may suffer. Many people also have much slower reaction times while awake due to sleep deprivation. In many cases, those with sleep apnea are also much more vulnerable to stress because of the poor sleep they receive.
One of the most common types of sleep apnea is obstructive sleep apnea, which causes your airways to collapse as you reach deeper levels of relaxation during sleep. There may be many reasons for this, such as being overweight or obese and having narrow airways. Another type of sleep apnea is central sleep apnea, which is where your brain stops sending signals to the muscles that control breathing. Both can interfere with many aspects of your life and cause life-altering symptoms.
Symptoms that May Affect Your Work
Sleep apnea can cause many symptoms that negatively affect your career. According to Harvard Business Review, poor sleep health is linked to many work performance issues. Sleep deprivation can have negative impacts on job performance, productivity, as well as career progression and career satisfaction.
If you’ve ever felt daytime sleepiness, you have probably experienced how sleep affects your work firsthand. It’s hard to focus and get work done when you feel tired. Sleep apnea sufferers may experience excessive daytime sleepiness frequently that causes overall poor work performance.
Sleep deprivation from sleep apnea can negatively affect cognition. Many people with sleep apnea find it difficult to concentrate, often describing this as having foggy thoughts or being unable to think clearly. Brain fog from sleep apnea can affect work productivity, efficiency, and accuracy. It can also negatively affect creativity, which is essential in many occupations.
Sleep is essential for healing and refreshing our mind and bodies. Poor sleep health can make it difficult to learn new things, think clearly, and also manage our emotions. Mood changes are another common symptom of sleep apnea. Irritability, depression, and anxiety can all also affect work performance and career progression.
Also, sleep is important for your immune system. Sleep fragmentation from sleep apnea can actually weaken the immune system. This may be one factor that helps explain the link between sleep deprivation and increased absenteeism at work. Therefore, there are several symptoms of sleep apnea that can hold you back in your career when left untreated.
People with Sleep Apnea Have a Higher Risk for Involuntary Job Loss
Being fired or laid off from a job can be one of the worst experiences for many people. Not only can it leave you without an income, but it can also affect your future job prospects. Yet, people with untreated sleep apnea may have a higher risk for being fired or laid off.
One study from 2019 published in Sleep academic journal looked at the connection between OSA and job loss. The researchers looked at 261 participants and found that 45% of them had a history of multiple job losses through firing or layoffs. Those with sleep apnea were twice as likely to have had multiple involuntary job losses compared to those without the sleep disorder.
However, since sleep apnea treatment can alleviate symptoms and improve sleep quality, using CPAP therapy may help reduce these risks. Many firings and layoffs are the result of below average work performance, which may be linked to the many symptoms of sleep apnea. Treatment may help people avoid these issues that often lead to job loss.
Sleep Apnea Treatment with CPAP Therapy
The goal of sleep apnea treatment is to reduce or eliminate the number of apnea events you experience during sleep. CPAP therapy is an effective treatment for many people and has quickly become the standard for treatment because of how effective it is.
CPAP therapy increases the air pressure inside your airways. This helps prevent your airways from collapsing and triggering apnea events. The result is that most sleep apnea sufferers wake less frequently during the night, get deeper and better quality sleep. Most people also see positive improvements in both symptoms and the negative health risks associated with sleep apnea.
Our providers may prescribe CPAP therapy if you have sleep apnea. We work with you to find treatment solutions that suit your lifestyle. Our team can help you find comfortable, effective CPAP therapy options to help you sleep well throughout the night. We also offer ongoing monitoring to help optimize treatment and help you feel your best. If you think you might have sleep apnea, take our sleep apnea risk quiz as a quick and easy screening tool.
Convenient, Affordable Men’s Health Management Solutions from Low T Center
Men’s health management is an important part of living a healthy, fulfilling life. Our team at Low T Center is here to help you maintain and manage your health through our convenient and affordable men’s health care services. We partner with you to address your health and find customized treatment solutions for everything from sleep apnea to erectile dysfunction. If you think you may have sleep apnea, order an at-home sleep test or make an appointment at one of our convenient locations. Living a healthy life is easy with our medical professionals on your side.
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Disclaimer: This article is made available for general, entertainment and educational purposes only. The opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of Low T Center. You should always seek the advice of a licensed healthcare professional.