Sleep Apnea, Sleep Loss, and the Low-T Connection

By Dr. Andrew I. J. Allshouse, N.D.

Many men ignore their snoring or have no idea they snore! Ask your spouse or partner if you snore and consider picking up an adjustable anti-snoring dental appliance. You can ask your dentist about these devices or discuss snoring with your primary care provider. You may even be able to improve your testosterone level by fixing your snoring! A recent analysis illustrated how snoring may result in less testosterone production! We are happy to perform a before and after T-check test at Revibe Men’s Health to see how it improves!

Many HCPs often refer patients to sleep clinics for sleep studies. Unfortunately, sleep clinics are largely not-well-covered by insurance and many patients complain about the expense of inconclusive sleep studies, and the expense of CPAPs, compliance with CPAPs, and frequent requests to repeat a sleep study. It’s important to raise awareness of snoring which causes frustrated partners and potentially frustrating testosterone level issues related to snoring.

Over-the-counter customizable and titratable antisnoring dental appliances are available for sale direct to consumers. Our HCPs often recommend brands like VitalSleep and SnoreRX for patients that we suspect may have untreated sleep apnea, report snoring, report poor compliance with their CPAP machine, or may have extra red cell production due to testosterone replacement therapy.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the American Academy of Dental Sleep Medicine support an intervention approach and specify that a customizable and titratable device is better than one that is custom and fixed.

Snoring appliances are recommended for individuals who snore and do not have sleep apnea, and for those with sleep apnea who either do not have or do not use their CPAP machines as prescribed.

More frequent snoring is associated with lower testosterone readings according to a recently published article. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35969946/

References

Su L, Chen J, et al. Association between snoring frequency and male serum testosterone: Findings from the 2015-2016 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Sleep Med. 2022 Aug 3;100:1-5.