It turns out, 50% of people who snore on a regular basis actually deal with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a condition in which muscles in the back of the throat fail to keep the airway open, resulting in brief but repeated interruptions in breathing.
Researchers wanted to discover just how strong the sleep apnea connection is for cognition, so they studied the brains1 of 27 middle-aged, healthy men with untreated OSA. The results? Participants with severe OSA had reduced vigilance, executive functioning, short-term visual recognition memory, and social and emotion recognition than the control group. Even participants with mild OSA had cognitive deficits compared to the control group, though they performed better than those with a more severe condition.
Translation: Sleep apnea (which is characterized by loud snoring) is strongly associated with cognitive deficits in otherwise healthy men—and as early as middle age.
Researchers believe the low oxygen and high carbon dioxide in the blood, changes in blood flow to the brain, and neuroinflammation is what causes these brain health concerns. And over time, it’s not great news for cognitive longevity.
