Do you have the symptoms of sleep apnoea?

Awareness of sleep apnoea and it’s symptoms is still quite low in the UK and it’s estimated 85% of sufferers remain undiagnosed, and therefore untreated. Symptoms of sleep apnoea mostly happen when your asleep, with some causing other symptoms that can affect your daily quality of life. 

Sleep Apnoea FAQs

Symptoms that happen while you sleep are:

Your breathing temporality stops and then suddenly starts again

You make gasping, snorting or choking noises while sleeping

You wake up a lot through the night

You snore loudly and often

Disturbed sleep can then cause other symptoms during the day such as:

Feeling very tired or drowsy

Finding it hard to concentrate, perhaps at work, or when driving

Waking up with a headache

Not feeling refreshed after a night’s sleep

Poor memory function

Irritability or anxiety

What is sleep apnoea?

Sleep apnoea, often called Obstructive Sleep Apnoea (OSA),  is a disorder that causes you to repeatedly stop breathing as you sleep and affects an estimated 1.5 million people in the UK. Your sleep is disturbed by sleep apnoea, which causes daytime sleepiness, poor concentration and in some cases anxiety and low mood. It can have a significant influence on your life if it is not treated and it might negatively affect your health if you don't get help. We are aware that many people continue to be undiagnosed -  the good news is that there are treatments that work.

If your throat closes completely when you sleep, you stop breathing for a time. It’s called an apnoea if it lasts for 10 seconds or more. When you stop breathing in your sleep, the body will wake you to restart your breathing, leading to very interrupted and poor-quality sleep. These micro-arousals, caused by the apnoea’s, often go completely unnoticed by the person despite occurring up to 400 times a night, It sometimes, but not always, goes hand in hand with loud snoring and/or gasping, snorting or choking noises as you sleep which are most often noticed by your partner. 

Other signs that you might be suffering from sleep apnoea can include:

Feeling very tired during the daytime

Regularly waking with headaches

Experiencing difficulty concentrating, feeling irritable or having mood swings

Looking for a home sleep study to find out if you have sleep apnoea?  

Explore our Home Sleep Test

How Vitapulse Health test for sleep apnoea

The conventional way to test for sleep apnoea requires you to attend a specialist sleep clinic, where you have to stay overnight to be monitored. Some people often find this not only inconvenient, but also have trouble sleeping as they normally would in this kind of environment, which can mean they might need several repeat tests in order to successfully diagnose the sleep apnoea.


With our sleep apnoea home sleep test, you can avoid lengthy waiting times because we send you the test equipment to use remotely in your own home, so you can follow your normal bedtime routine in the environment that you’re most comfortable in and relieve pressure on this area of the NHS. The testing equipment enables you to complete the sleep study over 1-10 nights in your home.


Our remote testing equipment is in line with appropriate diagnostic tests according to the American Academy of Sleep Apnoea (ASM). The advanced and unobtrusive sensor device is worn overnight and will track your sleep and breathing, syncing with an app on your phone each night to beam this data to our team of sleep disorder experts, who will diagnose if you have sleep apnoea and how severely you are being affected by the condition, usually within 24 hours of completion of the study.


All of the equipment and the app are compliant with data security regulations. 

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Did you know?

Here are some key facts about sleep apnoea (source: British Lung Foundation):

  • There are four types of sleep apnoea  - Obstructive Sleep Apnoea (OSA) (the most common type), Central Sleep Apnoea (CSA), Mixed Sleep Apnoea (a combination of OSA and CSA) and Obesity Hypoventilation.

    Sleep Apnoea is more common in those who are male, middle aged, elderly, and over-weight.

    It affects an estimated 1.5 million adults in the UK.

    Up to an estimated 85% of sufferers are undiagnosed.

    The BLF believe that treating OSA would save the NHS millions of pounds.

  • Only approximately 330,000 adults are currently being treated for sleep apnoea, out of a potential population of 1.5 million sufferers.

    Undiagnosed Obstructive Sleep Apnoea is closely associated with some serious health problems, such as hypertension, diabetes, stroke and heart disease.

    People whose work involves regular driving are hugely at risk if they have undiagnosed sleep apnoea, because if they fall asleep at the wheel they may cause collisions.