night time seizures and snoring

[Sylvia]

My husband says I snore loud and keeps him awake. I have tried over the counter stuff and nothing works. I know allergies play a role in it. I bought a air purifier and it works on the allergy snoring but not the other.
Could this have anything to do with my seizures at night? I have had EEG's that showed abnormal activity. I just wondered if anyone else has the same thing. I cannot say that if I snore I have a seizure because I don't always.

Thanks
Sylvia

 

[Cint]

Have you been checked for sleep apnea? Sometimes apnea could make seizures worse @ night.

Sleeping Disorders: Apnea Seizures

Epilepsy

Sleep apnea and epilepsy are two medical conditions that are often connected by their tendency to exacerbate the manifestation of each other. When a person experiences sleep apnea, the person is deprived of sleep because he or she tends to wake up at various times. The constant lack of sleep can decrease an epileptic patient's ability to fight off the occurrence of a seizure. On the other hand, the medication taken to treat epilepsy has side effects that affect the respiratory functions of the central system as well as relaxing the air passages. Thus, this can cause a predisposition to sleep apnea. Both of these conditions tend to cause seizures for people.

Sleep apnea seizures can take a major toll on the body. People who experience involuntary movement while they sleep tend to wake up tired and without energy in the morning. A headache is also most likely to set in. Besides the inconvenience of exhaustion, the effects of apnea seizures can also be life-threatening. The deprivation of sleep over prolonged periods of time can cause cardiac arrhythmia, or the irregular beating of the heart.

 

[KarenB]

As Cint mentioned, sleep apnea can be an issue with epilepsy. One of Jon's neurologists was part of a study at U of Michigan on the correlation between sleep issues and epilepsy. She was quite sure that Jon's nocturnal seizures were related to poor sleep, snoring, and difficulty breathing at night. Consequently, Jon had a tonsilectomy, which resolved the worst of the snoring and straining to breathe at night. But, unfortunately, it didn't resolve other sleep issues (frequent awakening) nor did it resolve his nocturnal seizures.

What did resolve the sleep issues (and ultimately brought seizure freedom) was a dose of magnesium and calcium at bedtime, and also his full daily dose of Zonegran in the evening.

Although he doesn't have seizures, my husband was having a dreadful time with snoring and what appeared to be sleep apnea (he'd be snoring really loud, and then just stop breathing...and I'd be lying there waiting for him to start breathing...and waiting...and...finally I'd poke him or something, and he'd gasp and then start breathing again). I never could get him to go get a sleep study. But, about 8 months ago, we started a new eating plan that had a lower glycemic load, featured only whole grains, and reduced consumption of gluten (wheat products) by about 90%. We both lost some weight, but even before losing much weight, the immediate benefit that we noticed with my husband was that he pretty much has stopped snoring. The only explanation I have for that is that gluten sensitivity is sometimes associated with inflammation (we both also have far less joint pain), and perhaps some sort of inflammation was causing the snoring.

Gluten is known to be a trigger for seizures -- you might try reducing or eliminating gluten from your diet and see if it has any effect on both your seizures and your snoring.

 

[Sylvia]

Thank you both for your comments. No I have not had a sleep study done. But since they increase my Lamictal from 150mg once a day to 300mg twice a day I have notice that now I have a gag reflex that I didn't have before. But the first of July I see the doctor and will make a list for him. Find at my age I have to write down everything.
Thanks again