Do you wake feeling tired or fatigued ? There are many factors that affect the quaility of our sleep but one often overlooked complicating factor is our spine’s relation to our sleep.
Sleep apnea is a condition characterized by multiple, often brief(seconds), episodes of waking throughout the night. This condition can cause symptoms such as fatigue, insulin sensitivity, and depression amongst a whole host of other conditions. Sleep apnea has several different causes is often exacerbated by alteration in our breathing or airway as we sleep.
How does this relate to the spine and chiropractic ? Many people suffer from anterior head carriage or a forward head posture, which results in rounding of the shoulders and translation of the head forward. When the head Is carried forward and in extension it stresses and narrows the airway causing aggravation of sleep apnea symptoms .
A recent study found,
”OSAG subjects showed changes in craniofacial morphology, with lower average pharyngeal space and greater distance from the hyoid bone to the mandibular plane, as compared with healthy subjects. Moreover, in OSA subjects, the greater the severity of OSA, the greater the head hyperextension and anteriorization.”
-Int Arch Otorhinolaryngol. 2016 (OSA= obstructive sleep apnea)
Basically, the more forward and up the head is carried the worse the symptoms of sleep apnea became. Chiropractic care addresses the structure of your spine and therefore improves the function of your body.
Dr. David Satterfield, Chiropractor
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