High Blood Pressure Symptoms and OSA

We talked about snoring and apneas events, and now it's time to speak a little about high blood pressure or hypertension.

Several studies have demonstrated clear evidence that implicates sleep apnea in the development of high blood pressure symptoms. More specifically, the severity of hypertension was found to progressively increase with severity of obstructive sleep apnea.

The Mechanisms that Link OSA with Hypertension

• the stimulation of the sympathetic nervous system through episodes of apnea.

  In other words, when you have apnea episodes in your sleep, you will stop breathing and your level of oxygen from your blood will drop substantially. This mechanism will increase sympathetic activity that directly elevate the blood pressure.

• Poorer quality of sleep and shorter sleep periods raise de level of blood pressure.


• Hypoxemia or low blood oxygen is a mechanism that appears to be important for triggering hypertension, even if you are a healthy person (when you are at high altitude, on the mountain).


• excess of body weight


• excess dietary sodium intake


• excess alcohol intake


• reduced physical activity


• inadequate intake of fruits, vegetables, and potassium

Treatments of high blood pressure symptoms

Is obvious that time is not on your side, because most of these problems are deadly.

In this movie you will learn more about hypertension and how it affects your health:

So, the best solution for a person with sleep apnea, to fight and treat hypertension, is to use CPAP . Yes! It's simple and without drugs.

Sustained and effective treatment of sleep apnea with CPAP or continuous positive airway pressure, has been reported to acutely decrease the levels of high blood pressure symptoms and sympathetic traffic during sleep.

Well, oral appliances that effectively attenuate your obstructive sleep apnea also may lower your blood pressure.

If you have a mild sleep disorder, you can try many types of other alternative treatments.

A good way to treat high blood pressure symptoms is to make life-style modification, such as:

• avoid salty and sodium-rich foods as often as you can. Salt makes you more thirsty and if you drink too much water, you might experience fluid overload that will increase your blood pressure.


• try to stay cool and avoid staying under the sun too much for the same reason that this would make you want to drink more.


• weight loss is a good idea, if you are overweight or obese person


• moderate alcohol intake of no more than two drinks per day


• Avoid fatty and deep fried foods, as well as those that are high in cholesterol. Not only it will trigger your blood pressure to rise significantly but will also put you at risk with stroke and heart attack.


• increase your physical activity such as brisk walking for at least 30 minutes for about 5 days/week


• smoking cessation to improve cardiovascular health

Some more interesting pages for you to check out:

• The link between pickwickian syndrome, Obesity and Sleep Apnea

• Diagnosing Apnea Syndrome with Polysomnography

• Resmed CPAP machines

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