• Sleeping Stages and Need
• Airway Pressure Advantages
• Sleep Apnea Diagnosing
• Sleep Apnea Causes & treatment
• Sleep Apnea Treatment
• Causes of Excessive Sleepiness
• Child Settling Problems
• Sleep Disorders
• Sleep Disturbances
• Dreams Psychology
• What Happens During Sleep
• Excessive Sleepiness Trouble Shooting
• Common Factors Producing Insomnia
• Family Bed-Sleeping with Baby
• Teach Child Good Sleep Habits
• Know about How Babies Sleep
• How Long to Sleep and Need
• Idiopathic Hypersomnia Reasons
• Insomnia Causes
• Insomnia Treatment
• Insomnia Definition and Cause
• International Health Problem
• Medications Helps Child Sleep Better
• Medications Improves Sleep Cycle
• Hard to Get up in the Morning
• First Move Against Insomnia
• Narcolepsy Sleep Attacks
• How Narcolepsy is Diagnosed
• Know About Night Waking
• Nightmares & Terrors
• Nightmares to Frightened
• Nocturnal Myoclonus Movement
• Restore Normal Breathing During Sleep
• Oral Appliances Treatment Options
• Overcome Common Aging Sleep Problems
• Parasomnia Exam and Tests
• Pre-School Children Problem
• Factors Reducing Treatments Effects
• Restless Legs Syndrome
• School Age Children Sleep Problems
• Sleep Problems for Elders
• Sleep and Aging Problems
• Relief Social Stress by Insomnia
• Sleep Disorder FAQ
• Sleeping Related Glossary

Idiopathic Hypersomnia: Reasons and Features

Idiopathic Hypersomnia Apparently a new condition just classified for those of us who just either need more sleep or are just sleepy a lot. People with the alpha delta abnormality seen in CFS & FM would fall into this category. Interesting reading by the Columbus Community Hospital Regional Sleep Disorder Center Accredited by the American Sleep Disorders Association.
This diagnosis can be explained as follows:

One could be chronically sleepy for the following reasons

• There is something wrong with sleep that makes it non-refreshing.
• There is a problem with the brain mechanisms which normally should keep one alert (whether caused by primary problems within the brain or its chemistry, or by other factors such as sedating medications or thyroid problems).

The most common causes of severe sleepiness beginning or progressively worsening in adults are Sleep Apnea and Related Breathing Disorders During Sleep.

If the problem instead is a primary disorder of brain chemistry, Narcolepsy is the leading diagnosis. As outlined elsewhere on this web site, people with narcolepsy are diagnosed either by a clear-cut history of their having had cataplexy, or via their demonstrating REM sleep in two or more daytime naps on a Multiple Sleep Latency Test.

Idiopathic CNS hypersomnia (or hypersomnolence. as it has been called) is a diagnosis applied to people who are excessively sleepy--but not because there is anything apparently wrong with their sleep, and not because of narcolepsy or any other identifiable cause.

It is basically a diagnosis of exclusion made by excluding all other possible diagnoses.

• Idiopathic is a more dignified way of saying that we don't know exactly what causes the problem.
• Hypersomnia is not the commonest diagnosis...but it is not rarely made, either.
• Hypersomnia does not appear to be one single entity. Various abnormalities of brain chemistry have been suggested in studies of such patients or suspected as being potential causes.

The brain is complex to the point that there would be many different possible ways to impair alertness.

Features of patients diagnosed with Idiopathic Hypersomnia

• People given this diagnosis are likely to sleep for long periods of time without feeling refreshed. They often do not feel any better after taking naps.
  It has been said that a history of not feeling refreshed after sleep will reliably differentiate sleep apnea and hypersomnia from narcolepsy, but I personally don't believe it. I have a number of patients with definite narcolepsy who find naps unrefreshing, and who also wake up feeling groggy and exhausted in the morning.
• People with idiopathic CNS hypersomnia often have family histories of this same sort of problem, of true narcolepsy or of both entities.
  Not infrequently, hypersomnia seems hereditary.
• For the most part, patients diagnosed as having hypersomnia report that their sleepiness began late in childhood, during their teen years, or in their early twenties.

Hypersomnolence resembles Narcolepsy in its typical age of onset.

For this reason, I am hesitant to make this diagnosis in people who develop sleepiness later in life. There is a greater possibility that people with late onset of sleepiness instead suffer from a specific underlying cause: one that should be identified and managed with specific treatment. They deserve a thorough evaluation.