It looks like snorers and, more importantly, their over-tired loved ones could finally get a good night's sleep — and it's as simple as popping a pill.
Putting a stop to snoring
This will be music, or more aptly silence, to the ears of snorers and their partners the world over — finally there is a simple and effective way to stop snoring. It doesn't involve breathing masks or taping up your nose and better still, has no side effects. It's as easy as taking a daily pill, which at this stage is only known by its code name, BGC20-0166.
Breathe easy
The pill is made up of a combination of two existing drugs that affect the areas of the brain associated with airflow and muscles in the airway. The idea is to open the upper airway, which narrows during sleep as the muscles relax. This narrowing of the airway reduces oxygen in the blood and makes for a restless night's sleep.
The verdict
It sounds easy, but is it really that simple and effective? According to the encouraging results, it is! The researchers monitored 39 patients who suffered from obstructive sleep apnoea, a condition that causes the sufferer to stop breathing during sleep and snore heavily. Those who were given the pill showed a 40 percent reduction in symptoms and suffered no side effects. Even more impressive, three out of 10 people taking the pill had a 50-percent reduction in symptoms.
Thomas Roth, director of the Sleep Disorders and Research Centre at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, USA, said, "The results from this trial demonstrate the potential of this drug to decrease sleep apnoea in some patients and normalise it in others."
Michael Polkey, a specialist in sleep and respiratory medicine at the Royal Brompton Hospital in London, was just as excited, saying, "This is the first drug therapy which may have an affect without changing sleep architecture."
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