The time spent in slumberland has a profound effect on two-thirds of a person’s life. However, a sizeable number of Puneites are suffering from daytime drowsiness, implying that they aren’t sleeping well at night.

A disorder called obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) is fast catching up among all age groups. OSAS is a potentially serious sleep disorder in which breathing repeatedly stops and starts. A person may be suffering from sleep apnea if s/he snores loudly and feels tired even after a full night’s sleep, say experts.

People working in shifts, including employees of entertainment, food and hospitality, aviation industries as well as IT and BPO professionals, are most at risk. “About 35% to 40% of newly diagnosed patients of sleep apnea are those working in shifts and following an erratic lifestyle,” said city-based sleep specialist and ENT surgeon Seemab Shaikh.

Shaikh is the national president of the Indian Association of Surgeons for Sleep Apnea, a pan-India body of doctors working in the field of sleep disorders. He sees around 800 new patients of sleep apnea in a year.

“Five years ago if I would see a patient every day, now I get to see two. The reasons for the rise are manifold. Faulty lifestyle, increasing obesity, rising stress levels and increased awareness about sleep apnea have contributed to the increase in cases,” he said.

The disrupted sleep causes drowsiness during the day and impacts performance at the workplace and personal life. “The patients mainly complain about poor quality sleep and excessive daytime sleepiness. Almost all of them have moderate to a severe breath-obstruction problem during sleep,” Shaikh shared.

A majority of these patients are from higher socio-economic strata. Most are obese and many are diabetic, hypertensive and elderly. They lead sedentary lives with poor physical activity. “In severe cases, the episode of breath obstruction is so frequent that sleep is completely destroyed or fragmented. Untreated OSAS can lead to uncontrolled blood pressure and diabetes, heart attack, strokes, even heart failure,” Shaikh said.

Senior medical expert K K Aggarwal, former national president Indian Medical Association (IMA), said, “OSAS is the most common type of sleep disorder and snoring is a noticeable sign. The low blood oxygen levels and disturbed sleep occurring due to OSA can lead to heart diseases.”

“About half the OSAS patients have high blood pressure. It is more common in men and chances of its occurrence increase with age. It could also be genetic, and people of certain ethnicities are more prone to it than others. This condition is also more common in people with a large neck circumference — greater than 17 inches for men and 15 inches for women,” Aggarwal said.

Noted singer-composer Bappi Lahiri who died at the age of 69 at a Mumbai hospital on February 15 suffered from Obstructive Sleep Apnea. Dr Seemab Shaikh, a Pune-based sleep specialist and founder and national president of Indian Association of Surgeons for Sleep Apnea, tells The Indian Express it is time the government declared it a medical disorder and not a lifestyle issue. Here are edited excerpts of an interview with Dr Shaikh:

Obstructive Sleep Apnea is a disorder where an obstruction can occur at different levels in the airway, thereby reducing oxygen supply to the body. This is a sleep-related breathing disorder and occurs when the throat muscles relax and block the airway during sleep. A noticeable sign of obstructive sleep apnea is snoring. We do not have enough data, but an average of 7 to 8 percent of the population is estimated to have this condition.

It is not taken seriously as it is considered normal to snore . Either it is ruled out as tiredness or having had a hard day at work. The older generation would often say that snoring is a phenomenon that is bound to occur with increasing age.

Over the last decade or so, there has been considerable awareness on Obstructive Sleep Apnea. There are associations like the Indian Association of Surgeons for Sleep Apnea and Indian Sleep Disorder Association which are working towards stepping up awareness at different levels. World Sleep Day is held on March 15 to raise awareness about sleep as a human privilege that is often compromised by modern lifestyle habits.

More work needs to be done in terms of educating society and making people realise it is easily treatable once the obstruction is located. We are doing lots of research, and studies are underway on different procedures that are available. Some procedures are being refined to yield better results. We are also analysing newer techniques and scrutinising the modality of treatment.

As part of our efforts, we are engaged in convincing the government to recognise sleep apnea as a medical disorder and not a lifestyle issue.

During the Covid-19 induced nationwide lockdown, specialists in Pune and across the country were challenged on how to tackle sleep-related disorders and conduct sleep studies at home with experts reporting incidence of such disorders has increased by 15-20 per cent. Doctors have also attributed anxiety levels as a contributing factor due to Covid-19 pandemic-related uncertainties.

Ahead of World Sleep Day on March 19, which has the theme ‘Regular Sleep, healthy future’, a consensus document has been released as a reference guide for physicians on how to practice sleep medicine during the pandemic.

Published in the Indian Journal of Sleep Medicine, the document talks about new onset sleep disturbances, including insomnia and circadian rhythm disorders, which have been reported in this period. Severe Covid-19 disease and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) may have shared risk factors, including advancing age, systemic hypertension and cardiovascular disease, the document states.

Dr Seemab Shaikh, founder president of the Indian Association of Surgeons for Sleep Apnea and one of the authors of the document, said the incidence of sleep disorders has increased by 15 to 20 percent. “Pre-Covid on a daily basis there were four to five consultations. Due to the lockdown, we started teleconsultations and there were at least eight to ten inquires with more cases once OPDs commenced,” Shaikh, who is also a consulting ENT and sleep specialist, told The Indian Express on Friday.

OSA is a sleep disorder where a person’s breathing stops involuntarily due to over relaxation of throat muscles. Such pauses in breath occur multiple times throughout the night, leading to disrupted and poor sleep.

Globally, OSA is on the rise and according to several studies, there is a steady increase in the number of people in India who suffer from this sleep disorder.

The Indian Association of Surgeons of Sleep Apnea will undertake a pan-India study of sleep apnea to record the incidence of the disorder in the general population.

“We are not screening the population, which is already facing this problem. We want to get a sense of how acute it is in the general population,” said Dr. Seemab Shaikh, founder national president of the Indian Association of Surgeons of Sleep Apnea, which is preparing a questionnaire to record authentic data about the disorder.

World Sleep Day is held on March 15 to raise awareness about sleep as a human privilege that is often compromised by modern lifestyle habits.

“There is a need to reduce the burden of sleep problems in society through better prevention and management of sleep disorders,” said Shaikh, adding, “The seriousness of the problem can also be gauged when marriage counselors often refer couples to our clinics for treatment for snoring. It impacts the overall health of the person and sleeps deprivation when one partner is snoring and can lead to irritability.”