![]() Daytime sleepiness often is the first symptom to appear. You also may experience a decrease in how alert and focused you feel during the day. After waking, you'll often feel refreshed but you'll get sleepy again. You might fall asleep for only a few minutes or up to a half-hour. It can be especially dangerous if you fall asleep while driving. For example, you may be working or talking with friends and suddenly fall asleep. It may happen when you're bored or during a task. People with narcolepsy fall asleep without warning. They include:Įxcessive daytime sleepiness. The symptoms of narcolepsy may get worse during the first few years of the disorder. Support from others - family, friends, employers and teachers - can help people cope with the disorder. However, medicines and lifestyle changes can help manage the symptoms. Narcolepsy is a life-long condition for which there's no cure. Most people who don't have cataplexy have type 2 narcolepsy. Most people with type 1 narcolepsy have cataplexy. This can be triggered by strong emotion, especially laughter. Sometimes narcolepsy also causes a sudden loss of muscle tone, known as cataplexy (KAT-uh-plek-see). This can cause serious problems in their daily routine. People with narcolepsy find it hard to stay awake for long periods of time. All have their own advantages and potential side effects and must be selected carefully for each individual patient.Narcolepsy is a sleep disorder that makes people very drowsy during the day. Medications Medications that can be helpful include stimulants and wakefulness promoting agents, sodium oxybate (Xyrem) which is ingested at night. Narcolepsy has no cure, but medications and lifestyle modifications can help you manage the symptoms. People who have narcolepsy fall asleep easily and enter into rapid eye movement (REM) sleep quickly. You will be given up to five ‘nap’ opportunities scheduled 2 hours apart. The MSLT measures how long it takes for you to fall asleep during the day. How is narcolepsy diagnosed?įormal diagnosis may require an overnight sleep study (polysomnogram) followed by a daytime Multiple Sleep Latency Test (MSLT). Because you may be semiawake when you begin dreaming, you experience your dreams as reality, and they may be particularly vivid and frightening. These hallucinations, called hypnagogic hallucinations, may take place when a person with narcolepsy falls quickly into REM sleep, as they do at sleep onset at night and periodically during the day. You may be aware of the condition and have no difficulty recalling it afterward, even if you had no control over what was happening to you. ![]() These episodes are usually brief - usually lasting only several seconds to several minutes - but they can be frightening. People with narcolepsy often experience a temporary inability to move or speak while falling asleep or upon waking. For example, your head may droop uncontrollably or your knees may suddenly buckle when you laugh. Cataplexy is uncontrollable and is often triggered by intense emotions, usually positive ones such as such as laughter or excitement, but sometimes fear, surprise or anger. This condition can cause a range of physical changes, from slurred speech to complete weakness of most muscles, and may last for a few seconds to a few minutes. You may sleep for just a few minutes or up to a half-hour before awakening and feeling refreshed, but then you fall asleep again.Ĭataplexy. For example, you may suddenly nod off while at work or talking with friends. People with narcolepsy fall asleep without warning, anywhere and at any time. The primary characteristic of narcolepsy is overwhelming drowsiness and an uncontrollable need to sleep during the day. What are the symptoms of narcolepsy?Įxcessive daytime sleepiness. Narcolepsy is hereditary such that some individuals appear genetically predisposed to develop it. Brain cells in the lateral hypothalamus that produce a neurotransmitter called hypocretin or orexin are lost. The cause in the vast majority of cases has been found to be a specific problem with the chemical “neurotransmitters” that regulate communications between different groups of nerve cells in the brain. ![]() Although there’s no cure for narcolepsy, medications and lifestyle changes can help you manage the symptoms. Narcolepsy can cause serious disruptions in your personal and professional lives. People with narcolepsy often find it difficult to stay awake for long periods of time, regardless of the circumstances. Narcolepsy is a chronic sleep disorder characterized by overwhelming daytime sleepiness and sudden attacks of sleep.
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