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Snorers More Likely to Gain Weight than Quiet Sleepers | |
| By JANET McCONNAUGHEY Associated Press Writer NEW ORLEANS -Zzzzzzknx. Sknrf. Zzzzzzknx. That could be the sound of a few pounds gathering around your waist. Older men who snore gain more weight than silent sleepers, a study has found. Many people who snore also stop breathing for a few seconds, a condition called sleep apnea. The lack of breath wakes the sleeper - often so briefly he does not realize it - and can leave him feeling sleepy during the day. Previous research has indicated that obesity can contribute to sleep apnea; one possible explanation is that the sleeper's fat pushes down on the airway, interfering with breathing. The new research indicates that sleep apnea may also cause weight gain, said Dr. J.W. Weiss, lead author of a study presented Tuesday at a meeting of the American Thoracic Society and the American Lung Association. Weiss theorized that apnea sufferers are too tired to want to do much, and start putting on the weight. "It makes us rethink the way we look at obesity and sleep apnea," said Dr. Norman H. Edelman, the ALA's consultant for medical affairs and a professor at the State University of New York at Stonybrook Medical School Sleep apnea affects 4 percent to 5 percent of adult men. For some reason, men appear twice as likely as women to develop the disorder. The research involved 508 veterans taking part in a long-running Veterans Administration study on aging. They ranged in age from 47 to 90 at the start of the research on snoring and obesity. In the early 1990s, Weiss and three other Boston-area doctors added questions about sleep. The questions were asked whenever a participant visited his doctor. Participants were weighed then, and again three years later. After taking into account the veterans' ages and initial weight, the researchers found that after three years the snorers gained a few pounds more on average than the quiet sleepers. Other questions indicated that the symptoms of sleep apnea dated back many years for many of the men. "If you can extrapolate back, it's likely that the cumulative weight over time may well be substantial," Weiss said. Weiss is from Beth Israel Hospital and Harvard Medical School. His colleagues are at Channing Laboratory and Brigham and Women's Hospital. Sleep apnea is not the only cause of sleepiness, and many things can contribute to weight gain. However, since many of the people in the study were retired, work schedules and second jobs were not causing the sleep problems, Weiss said. Edelman said the study suggests that weight gain and sleep apnea increase each other: "The whole thing kind of feeds on itself in a loop." | |