Most adults need at least eight to nine hours of sleep every day but some people may need more or less sleep than others depending on their physical and mental condition and work type. However, sleep deprivation or poor quality of the sleep can have severe consequences. Even excessive sleepiness can cause many health complications. Lack of sleep or excessive sleep can cause major health issues such as heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and weight gain or memory loss. If you aren’t getting enough shut-eye or experiencing excessive sleepiness due to some obvious or unexplained reasons, it can be a tell-tale sign of a sleep disorder.
Watch out these signs and symptoms in you to get instant medical attention:
- You frequently wake up in the night and have trouble falling asleep again.
- You frequently experience daytime sleepiness, need frequent naps or fall asleep unintentionally or at inappropriate times of the day or at any locations.
- You take at least more than 30 minutes every day to fall asleep.
- Your spouse or partner often complain about your snoring, gasping, snorting or choking sounds during sleep or you gasp for breath due to interrupted breathing in sleep and often wake up in the night. Next day you do not feel fresh and energetic rather you feel very sleepy.
- You experience creeping, crawling, tingling, tugging or prickling sensations in your legs or arms, especially when you lie down on the bed or trying to fall asleep.
- You often jerk your legs or arms and your partner complains about that.
- You always experience headache after waking up from your sleep.
- You experience vivid, dream-like experiences or hallucinations during sleep or while falling asleep.
- You exhibit unusual behaviors during sleep such as sleepwalking or sleep talking.
- You experience frequent episodes of muscle weakness when displaying strong emotions such as when you’re angry, fearful or laughing.
- You feel that you’re unable to move your body when you first wake up in the morning.
If any of these symptoms are your regular experiences then it can be one of the severe sleep disorders such as insomnia, sleep apnea, restless legs syndrome, shift work sleep disorder and narcolepsy. Over the time, it not only disrupts your sleep pattern but it also derails your day to day life.
Modafinil is a recommended drug to treat excessive sleepiness in people with shift work sleep disorder, sleep apnea, and narcolepsy. Modafinil acts as a wakeful enhancing agent that stimulates dopamine levels in the brain causing an individual to be fully alert, awake and concentrated. Under the impact of Modafinil you can experience increased energy, your weariness runs thousand miles away from you and your cognitive skills are enhanced.
Excessive sleepiness hampers your productivity and performance at all levels and sleep loss has also been linked to road accidents and occupational hazards. Thus, do not sacrifice your sleep for work or family. Instead sleep well to work and for the family!