My son it a bit older than yours - almost 39 months now, but has had sleep issues for a few years. Since his snoring got so constant and to the point he sounds like a freight train this past year, I spoke with his pediatrician about it and she ordered a sleep study done and a referral to an ENT after a visual examination showed enlarged tonsils. The sleep study was performed in the hospital last month, and verified obstructive apnea. The ENT we saw earlier today agreed with the pediatrician and the study, and has scheduled surgery to remove his tonsils and adenoids.
During our appointment, I was told by the ENT that a nasal steroid is available to help, but is not always successful whereas the surgery removing the tonsils and adenoids has a proven success rate in alleviating sleep problems associated with obstructive apnea - I opted for the surgery.
Given that your husband has a history of sleep apnea, it might be good to talk with your pediatrician, mention your husband's history and son's behavior, and have his tonsils checked to determine whether the sleep issues he's having are apnea from obstruction or something else. Certainly can't hurt either way, and once it's determined what it is, everyone might sleep a little easier
Both my niece and nephew have been diagnosed with sleep apnoea at age 3. They undertook a sleep study in the children's hospital with all sorts of monitors attatched to them. Their parents slept alongside them in little beds.
As a result of the study they both had their tonsils and adenoids removed (they were abnormally large). This has helped them sleep and therefore behaviour etc is much better.
Good luck with your little fellow.
I posted yesterday about son not sleeping, and I was curious to see who has a toddler with sleep apnea? I think it may be likely culprit here as hubby has it severely and wears a c-pap mask to sleep with.
How do they diagnose it in little ones? What are the treatments? I notice that when son sleeps on my lap he will breathe very silently for a while, then awake himslef with a large deep breathe or a snore. Any advice, answers would be great.
When my oldest was young, around 4, a team came to our house to do a sleep study. The had him hooked up to all kinds of things. It was so nice that they came where he was comfortable and could sleep. I remember working on a huge jigsaw puzzle all night. He was found to have pretty sever apnea, I was blown away by how many times he stopped breathing. They also go to see a night terror episode. He also had tonsils and adnoids removed. Helped ear problems a lot, but still had the apnea. Still does, 20 some years later. Happily, there are lots of treatments now.I would start with a referral to an ENT, they would then request the sleep study. A pulmunologist can also request a sleep study, but if it comes back with signs of apnea, the first thing they will do is refer your ds to an ENT.
My ds did not need a sleep study, but they did remove his tonsils and adenoids. They wanted to do one but went ahead with the surgery any way, we were tired of tests at that point, and didn't want Zach to go thru any more. His adenoids were huge, and causing more breathing problems than his tonsils.
Unfortuantely, even though the surgery improved his breathing, he was still struggling with apnea episodes, so we are now seeing a pulmunologist. Zach finally had a sleep study about 3 mths ago, and showed he still has apnea even after surgery. The hardest thing about the sleep study for Zach was having to tolerate the noise from the air compressor they used to help the glue dry. If you use melatonin you should still be allowed to use it, which really helped in Zach's case.
Good luck.