Here's another study trying to find causation for Alzheimer's disease. A study found that lean people with sleep disturbances were more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease.
When my husband and I moved to Arizona, one of our primary care physicians, Dr. R. suggested that sleep problems including loud snoring and breath stopping( I could count to fourteen before my husband inhaled after a loud snore which awakened me) might be causing his Mild Cognitive Impairment with which Bob had been diagnosed in 2006.
But my husband refused to follow through with the sleep assessment. He didn't want to stay overnight in the physician's office with a cathode attached to his finger and electrodes attached to his head and a clinician watching him sleep. And the treatment isn't any fun either. It is hard to get used to the machine that helps one breathe without interruption.I understand but if it were me, I'd pay attention because I now know what a difficulty it really is to lose oneself to Alzheimer's disease.
Not that anything is guaranteed, we know. We may suffer the inconvenience of a sleep apnea machine and still develop Alzheimer's disease. And I do ignore most of the correlational study results, but this one makes sense to me. The study participants who were lean and had sleep disturbance had smaller hyppocampus development. That is the region of the brain where memories are formed and stored.
Schedule cuddle time with your partner for the early morning and save yourself--literally--for your old age.
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