Sleep Apnea

Consolidating research from diverse fields, this practical reference encompasses the pathophysiological, epidemiological, and therapeutic implications of sleep apnea in cardiovascular diseases. This book clearly connects the role of sleep apnea to vascular heart and brain diseases. Considering both how apneic phenomena can aggravate cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases and how its treatment may alleviate the physiological derangements and symptoms of these diseases, "Sleep Apnea" narrates the acute effects of recurrent hypoxia, hypercapnia, and arousals from sleep on central and peripheral chemoreceptors, central cardiovascular sympathetic neurons, blood pressure, heart rate, cardiac output, and cerebral blood flow. Offering theoretical models of interactions between heart failure and periodic breathing, this book reviews the potential for heart failure to facilitate Cheyne-Stokes respiration and upper airway obstruction. It compares the effects between sleep apnea and normal sleep on hemodynamics and autonomic control of the heart and circulation. Written by over 30 internationally recognized specialists and supplemented with nearly 2000 literature references, drawings, photographs, tables, and equations, "Sleep Apnea" is a necessary resource for all pulmonologists, cardiologists, clinical neurologists, sleep disorder specialists, pharmacologists, physiologists, general and thoracic surgeons, and graduate and medical school students in these disciplines.