Sam Valdez, SLV Regional Medical Center sleep technician, prepares equipment to monitor a patient’s sleeping in the hospital’s new sleep clinic. The overnight test will confirm if the patient has sleep apnea.

BY LISA MOORE

ALAMOSA — Valley native Sam Valdez returned to Alamosa to watch people sleep. And to save their lives. Valdez is a sleep technician in the area’s first ever sleep clinic which opened this week at SLV Regional Medical Center.

Valdez graduated from Alamosa High in 1990 and while attending Adams State College, worked as a respiratory tech at SLVRMC. He moved to Texas and eventually trained as a sleep tech for a clinic in Sherman. When presented with the opportunity to return to Alamosa, he took it. “Our primary purpose is to help diagnose and treat sleep apnea,” he said.

Apnea is a serious disorder where a person’s breathing stops during sleep, sometimes hundreds of times, for seconds to a minute or so. The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute estimates that 12 million to 18 million people in the U.S. have moderate to severe apnea which has been linked to a greater risk of heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, diabetes and excessive daytime sleepiness.

Sleep apnea cannot be diagnosed in a routine office visit but must be done while a patient sleeps and with specific medical equipment. Until now, patients suspected of having apnea were referred for testing out of the Valley. As of Aug. 25, patients can be spared a sleepy drive over the mountain and report instead to the hospital’s third floor, with a doctor’s prescription.

“A patient will come in around 8 or 9 at night,” Valdez said. “I hook them up to several EG wires so I can monitor their stages of sleep, their heart rate, snoring, breathing, leg movement. I can tell many different things that are going on, aside from just the apnea.”

The two study rooms, while located in the hospital, are designed to look more like a home. “We try and make it cozy and use a regular bed,” he said. There is a camera in the room allowing Valdez to visually monitor the patient’s sleep from a separate office. If the test reveals interruptions in breathing, Valdez will put a CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) mask on the patient. The mask is hooked up to a machine that delivers a continuous flow of air into the nostrils which helps keep the airways open so that breathing is not impaired.

Valdez cautions that waking up without a mask does not mean a patient does not have apnea. “It is just that we didn’t have enough time during the night,” he said. “We send our reports to the doctors and they make the determination.”

Some of the symptoms for sleep apnea are: waking up with a very sore and/or dry throat, occasionally waking up with a choking or gasping sensation, sleepiness during the day, morning headaches, forgetfulness, mood changes and a decreased interest in sex, and recurrent awakenings or insomnia. Men, overweight people, and people over 40 are at greater risk for sleep apnea.

It is a serious disorder and should be followed-up under a physician’s care.

For more information about the sleep clinic at SLVRMC, call 589-2511.