Snoring is where the upper airways, so kind of like your nose, your mouth, your throat, kind of all that area in there, where you kind of get some type of blockage in there and that kind of gives you that sound for snoring. So with that, I'm sure many a people or many a spouse have probably heard it, but just that kind of almost rattling type sound a little bit kind of when someone takes a breath in and out.
Probably about 45% of males snore and about 30% or so, maybe a little bit less, females snore. Okay, and that's in terms of storing on a regular basis. But in terms of people just snoring maybe once a week or once a month, that pretty much is everybody that will snore on occasion here and there. So it's not necessarily unhealthy, but it can be a sign of something that needs to be checked out.
In terms of snoring, times when it would be really good to go see a medical professional to get checked out about this is, number one, if you're feeling tired throughout the day. So that would be a big reason. The other is if you feel like, "Hey, I'm just not rested when I wake up throughout the day." Or if you kind of wake up with headaches on a regular basis. Or you wake up and feel like, "Hey, I have to almost kind of lay there for a bit before I can actually get moving during the day." Those would be reasons to get checked out. Another reason to get checked out as if you already have some other health issues going on. Say you have high blood pressure or something like that, it would be worthwhile to go and get checked out to make sure, "Hey, would it be beneficial for you to get some more evaluation?"
Some solutions to snoring that you can try, one is just laying on your side. So if you're a back sleeper or a front sleeper, that can compress some of those airways a little bit more and again produce that sound. So if you can sleep on your side, that can help. And if you've been a long time back sleeper, just trying to prop yourself up with pillows is a good way to kind of make you sleep on your side.
The other thing is, especially here in the Dayton area, very prone to having some allergy or sinus type issues. So if you do have some of those it would be good idea to either get treated for that or try some over the counter medications to try to make some of those allergies and some of that congestion a little bit better because that'll help in terms of breathing.
Some observational studies have shown that smoking might contribute to snoring. So if you can cut back on that, that'll help in more ways than one, not just for the snoring but for other health issues as well. And the same thing goes with alcohol. If you drank quite a bit of alcohol, especially if you do it before you go to bed, that can also contribute to making those airways a little bit too relaxed and causing some of that snoring sound.
Thing that would suggest that snoring is more serious for you is, one, if you actually are on the heavier side because that tends to be kind of associated with some of the things we get concerned about with snoring, like sleep apnea.
Sleep apnea is kind of the main condition that we associate with snoring. And for sleep apnea, again, your airways, you're not getting that air in and out, and so at times your body will basically have trouble actually breathing throughout the night.
The problem is you never can get into that really good deep sleep because you keep waking up throughout the night. And these times when you wake up, it might even be something that you don't notice. It might just be a thing of, okay you woke up, went back to sleep and you didn't recognize it. But if that's happening many times a night, it's going to really affect your sleep.
If you do have one of those conditions that are associated with snoring like you have some sleep apnea, if you get on those specific treatments, like a sleep machine or something like that, it can completely alleviate the storing that you have.
