Snoring vs. Sleep Apnea: How to Tell the Difference

Once more, your partner has woken you up from your sleep. “You’ve done it again,” she says. “The snore, then the pause and that gasp.” Next day, you dismiss it, but somewhere deep inside, you wonder if it is the snore or something else.

You are one among many who are wondering about this. There are millions of people who rise in the morning wondering whether they are at one end of the spectrum or not, and truth be told, they both sound pretty much alike on the outside. They are however not the same and knowing this will be very important for your health, energy levels, and even your smile.

Snoring Is a Sound. Sleep Apnea Is a Health Problem.

This is the basic way of looking at it. Snoring is simply noise produced when your soft palate and throat tissues vibrate due to air going through a partly blocked air passage. It may be irritating but is harmless, most of the time, on its own.

Sleep apnea, however, is very different from that. When you have obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), your air passage not only gets narrow; it actually closes completely, and this happens several times within an hour. Your brain wakes you up briefly to open your air passage again and then you go back to sleep without knowing anything about it. This explains why apnea makes one sleepy, despite having slept a whole night.

The Tell-Tale Pattern: Snore, Silence, Gasp

If you share a bed with another person, find out what they really hear. Pure snoring is more or less constant and unchanging – the droning sounds all through the night. On the other hand, the pattern of sounds associated with sleep apnea includes loud snoring and silence because breathing ceases for some time, followed by a quick sound of gasping.

The mentioned cycle is one of the clearest indications. However, it is also helpful to understand that you are not alone in your case of snoring. According to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, nearly 94 percent of those people who suffer from obstructive sleep apnea snore. It means that if you snore, then you do not necessarily have sleep apnea.

What Your Days Are Telling You

That’s when most folks tend to miss the diagnosis, as the true symptoms of sleep apnea will usually be exhibited during the daytime, rather than nighttime. Ask yourself honestly:

Are you waking up in the mornings with headaches or an incredibly dry mouth? Do you find yourself exhausted by mid-day even though you went to bed very early that night? Have you been falling asleep during meetings or while sitting at a stop light? Has your mood or attention span changed recently without any apparent cause? Normal snoring rarely leads to symptoms like these during the daytime. Sleep apnea will almost certainly lead to such symptoms because of its effects on your sleep.

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Why Your Jaw Might Be Part of the Story

One of the aspects that many people fail to look into when visiting their dentists is the issue of their improper bite, which may be causing all their breathing issues. Small upper jaw, backward lower jaw, and crowded teeth are some of the things that lead to the reduction of the space available for airway and tongue movement, hence the likelihood of having snoring and sleep apnea increases.

This is why orthodontists like Dr. Jordan Lamberton at Hello Ortho pay attention to more than just straightening the teeth. MARPE device is used to expand the small upper jaw by applying pressure using it, and it helps in opening the airway and enhancing breathing. Herbst appliance work the same way but on the lower jaw.

Getting a Real Answer

However, snoring vs. sleep apnea cannot be determined through self-assessment alone. According to the Cleveland Clinic, even today, a sleep study conducted either in a laboratory or at home remains the only diagnostic method for this condition. However, if you have already noticed those typical signs of choking during sleep, fatigue during the day, and clenched and cramped jaw and teeth, then why delay your diagnosis until it becomes definite?

Let’s start with the discussion of your problem. In Hello Ortho, we will take into consideration your bite, the jaw, and the airway, since the improvement of both of them often goes together. If the snoring has caused trouble in your family for quite a while, book a free consultation with us in Napa or Petaluma.