Sleep Medicine Information

David Bruce, DDS, MD is the physician at the Sterling Rock Falls Clinic specializing in sleep disorders.

The Sterling Rock Falls Clinic now has its own Sleep Clinic available for your needs. Please phone (815) 625-4790 and ask to speak to the Sleep Nurse to make an appointment.

Reading Material:

"High Blood Pressure and Sleep Apnea: What's the Connection?"
By Dr. David Bruce

Choose: HTML (32 KB)  OR  PDF (568 KB)

Question Answer Forms:

Links to other Sleep Disorder web sites:

Common types of sleep disorders

Sleep Apnea

When a person stops and starts breathing again many times during the night.

There are 3 different types of sleep apnea:

• Obstructive Sleep Apnea is when the airway becomes blocked by excess nasal and oral tissue and over-relaxed throat and tongue muscles, and your breathing stops for 10-90 seconds. When this happens your body struggles for air and you waken briefly, breathing again. This may happen several hundred times during a night's sleep.
• Central Sleep Apnea is when the brain "neglects" to tell your breathing muscles to move and the lack of oxygen causes you to wake up and let breathing resume.
• Mixed Sleep Apnea involves brief periods of central sleep apnea followed by longer periods of obstructive sleep apnea.

Several signs of sleep apnea include loud snoring followed by a restless pause, restless movements, high blood pressure morning headaches, problems with memory and concentration or extreme tiredness.

Chronic Insomnia

When a person has trouble falling asleep or staying asleep night after night. Common causes of chronic insomnia are stress, worry, excitement, anxiety, depression, pain or medication.

Periodic Limb Movement Disorder

When a person rhythmically moves their arms or legs and rocking of the neck while asleep causing fragmentation of good, restorative sleep resulting in daytime sleepiness.

Narcolepsy

When a person falls asleep suddenly many times a day. Some of the signs of narcolepsy include extreme sleepiness, hallucinations just before or after sleep, muscle weakness during strong emotions and the inability to move just after waking up.

The Sleep Medicine Center at CGH Medical Center

The Sleep Center at CGH Medical Center is a state-of-the-art facility. It is comfortably decorated with full-size beds, TVs, VCRs, plus juices and snacks are available. Behind the scenes of your comfortable environment is a well-trained staff and very sophisticated equipment.

While you are at the Sleep Center, a nocturnal polysomnogram will be done. It's a simple (and painless) procedure that will measure bodily functions during sleep. Brain waves, heartbeats, eye movements and muscle tension will be monitored along with leg movements, airflow breathing, chest and abdominal breathing and blood oxygen levels. Audio and visual monitoring is also used to determine movement, position changes and snoring.

Contact our sleep medicine physician, Dr. Bruce at (815) 625-4790 for a referral to the Sleep Center.

To see more on CGH Sleep Center, click on www.cghmc.com, click on Our Services and then Sleep Center.