Sleep apnea is a sleep disorder that is characterized by pauses in breathing or low breathing for a period of sleep. A pause in breathing of at least 10 seconds, referred to as an apnea, can occur up to hundreds of times per night causing interrupted sleep to the sufferer, with the sufferer often, not even being aware of the condition and that they are being partly woken frequently throughout the night.

A sleep apnea test is conducted to find out the cause of a sleeping problem. Sleep apnea is a condition where the upper airways are obstructed during sleep, causing lowered levels of blood oxygen saturation. The most common types of sleep apnea are obstructive, which is mainly due to the relaxing of the throat muscles, and central sleep apnea, which occurs when the brain fails to send the right signals to the muscles that control breathing.

To diagnose obstructive sleep apnea, your doctor will use a test called "polysomnography". This can be one of two types:

• An overnight test

• Home monitoring test

The overnight test tracks brain waves, eye movement, breathing, blood oxygen, muscle tension, and snoring. The home test involves being hooked up to electrodes by a sleep technologist to record your sleep at home and coming back with the results in a couple of days in the morning. There are also sleep studies, called "polysomnograms" which are overnight tests that monitor various body activities to find out the cause of sleeping problems.

Sleep apnea treatment includes lifestyle changes, physical interventions, oral devices, surgery, prescription medicines and breathing machines. A particular type of treatment may not work on its own, thus require a mixture of sleep apnea treatment to treat the sleep disorder.

A few precautions that the patient for sleep apnea must do before having the sleep test conducted include not drinking any liquor or alcohol, not taking medications, getting in shape, and quitting smoking. The most widely used of the current sleep apnea treatments is continuous positive airway pressure, or CPAP. This sleep apnea treatment requires the patient to wear a mask while sleeping either over the nose, over the mouth, or both.