Tired? IDM opens sleep disorder clinic
Facility to address growing health issue
By ROB PRICE THE COURIER-ADVOCATE

PHOTO BY ROB PRICE George Bliss, director of nursing at Ira Davenport Hospital, shows off one of the beds in the hospital's new sleep disorder clinic.

BATH - Feeling pooped? It's possible you have a sleep disorder.

Increasing numbers of Americans are being diagnosed with disorders that involve the inability - or all too easy inclination - to sleep. The most common sleep disorder, sleep apnea, afflicts up to 12 million Americans, according to the American Sleep Apnea Association.

Accordingly, hospitals across the country have been developing specialized programs to diagnose and provide treatment for sleep disorders. Now, Ira Davenport Memorial Hospital is opening a clinic specifically designed to treat sleep disorders affecting residents of central Steuben County.

According to James Watson, chief executive officer of the hospital, IDM has developed the clinic through a collaboration with Arnot Ogden Medical Center. The clinic maintains two sleeping rooms, each with a single bed, sitting area, private bathroom and range of medical instruments to monitor patients while they try sleeping through a night.

Watson said IDM's own physicians began recommending development of the clinic a year ago, noting they were referring more and more patients to distant treatment centers that were difficult for the patients to reach.

"The demand for this type of service has really mushroomed in the last couple of years," Watson said Thursday, after a ribbon cutting ceremony that officially opened the facility.

The clinic is overseen by Dr. Mark Ivanich, a pulmonologist on the IDM medical staff and a medically certified expert on sleep disorders. Managing the day-to-day business of the clinic is Rhonda Reynolds, director of carrdiopulmonary services for IDM Hospital.

According to Reynolds, symptoms of a sleep disorder can range from tiredness to headaches and muscle aches. Actual sleep disorders include: sleep apnea, in which the body fails to breath during sleep, thereby reducing the oxygen content of the blood; insomina, in which the subject fails to sleep adequately at night, and narcolepsy, in which the patient falls asleep uncontrollably during normal waking hours.

Individuals who suspect they may have a sleep disorder - or who simply suffer from unaccountable tiredness - should consult their family physician for a check-up. In central Steuben County, the physician may refer the patient to a specialist at IDM Hospital, who in turn may recommend a diagnostic procedure in the sleep disorder clinic.

In that case, Reynolds said, the patient arrives at the hospital for a sleepover. He or she climbs into one of the hospital's two extremely comfortable beds, is attached to a variety of monitoring devices and then, hopefully, falls asleep.

In the event of a sleep apnea issue, the patient may be attached to a small machine called a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure device. Thousands of people suffering from sleep apnea now have these machines - also called CPAPs - on their bedside table and use them for an enhanced night of sleep, Reynolds said.

Sleep disorders can be more complicated than suffering from loud snoring, Reynolds cautioned. They are frequently associated with obesity, and since sleep disorders can reduce the body's supply of oxygen, they are frequently associated with heart and artery disease.

IDM officials cautioned people who suspect they suffer from a sleep disorder should not try to diagnose themselves. That's the job of the family doctor.