Narcolepsy Symptoms
Narcolepsy is a neurological disorder that affects your ability to wake and sleep. People with narcolepsy have excessive, uncontrollable daytime sleepiness. They may also suddenly fall asleep at any time, during any type of activity.
In a typical sleep cycle, we enter the early stages of sleep, then the deeper stages, and finally (after about 90 minutes) rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. People with narcolepsy go into REM sleep almost immediately in the sleep cycle and sometimes while they’re awake.
Type 1 narcolepsy comes with a sudden loss of muscle tone that causes weakness and makes you unable to control your muscles (cataplexy). Type 2 is narcolepsy without cataplexy.
In many cases, narcolepsy isn’t diagnosed and therefore isn’t treated.
Causes
Experts don’t know what causes narcolepsy. They think it involves multiple things that come together to cause problems in your brain and disturb your REM sleep.
Scientists are getting closer to finding genes linked to the disorder. These genes control the production of chemicals in your brain that may signal sleep and awake cycles.
Some experts think narcolepsy may happen because your brain has a hard time making a chemical called hypocretin. They’ve also found problems in parts of the brain involved in controlling REM sleep.
Risk factors for narcolepsy include your age. Narcolepsy usually begins between the ages of 15 and 25, but it can show up at any age. If you have a family history of narcolepsy, your risk of getting it is 20 to 40 times higher.
Symptoms
In REM sleep, we can dream and have muscle paralysis, which explains some of the symptoms of narcolepsy. Those symptoms may include:
⦁ Excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS): In general, EDS makes it harder to do everyday activities, even if you got enough sleep at night. The lack of energy can make it hard to concentrate. You have memory lapses and feel depressed or exhausted.
⦁ Cataplexy: This can cause problems ranging from slurred speech to total body collapse, depending on the muscles involved. It’s often triggered by intense emotions such as surprise, laughter, or anger.
Hallucinations:
⦁ These delusions can happen at any time and are often vivid and frightening. They’re mostly visual, but any of the other senses can be involved. If they happen as you’re falling asleep, they’re called hypnagogic hallucinations. If they happen when you’re waking up, they’re called hypnopompic
⦁ hallucinations.
Sleep paralysis: You may be unable move or speak while falling asleep or waking up. These episodes usually last a few seconds to several minutes.
⦁ Disrupted sleep: You might have a hard time staying asleep at night because of things like vivid
⦁ dreams,
⦁ breathing problems, or body movements.
Prevention
There is not much that can be done to prevent narcolepsy. Narcolepsy is caused by a loss of a neurotransmitter (chemical signal) in the brain called hypocretin. Hypocretin is important for regulating the sleep/wake cycle. Other causes include an autoimmune disease that could be attacking the cells that produce hypocretin, family history, brain injury or tumor, infections or exposure to toxins.
Treatment
You can speak with a general practitioner by dialing 3112 with an Airtel line or 09031130113 with any other line or download the Doc-on-Call247 app on google and apple play store.
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