When you can't sleep—or you sleep but still feel exhausted—sleep disorder diagnosis, the process doctors use to identify the root cause of persistent sleep problems. It's not just about counting hours. It's about spotting patterns, ruling out hidden causes, and connecting your symptoms to real medical conditions. Many people think they have "insomnia," but that’s just a symptom, not a diagnosis. The real issue could be sleep apnea, a condition where breathing stops repeatedly during sleep, often without the person knowing, or circadian rhythm disorders, when your internal body clock is out of sync with the day-night cycle. These aren’t the same as simply lying awake at night. They need different treatments, and skipping the right diagnosis can make things worse.
Doctors don’t guess. They look for clues: Do you snore loudly and wake up gasping? That’s a red flag for sleep apnea. Do you toss and turn for hours even when you’re exhausted? That could point to anxiety, restless legs, or another disorder. Do you fall asleep at odd times—like mid-conversation or while driving? That’s not laziness. It’s a signal your brain isn’t getting proper rest. A sleep study, often done at home now, records your breathing, heart rate, and brain waves while you sleep. It’s the only way to confirm sleep apnea or narcolepsy. Blood tests, questionnaires, and even keeping a sleep diary for two weeks help narrow it down. The goal isn’t to label you—it’s to find what’s broken so it can be fixed.
What you’ll find in the posts below isn’t theory. It’s real-world insight from people who’ve been through it. You’ll see how sleep disorder diagnosis connects to medication side effects—like how metoclopramide can mess with sleep, or how sedating drugs increase fall risk in older adults. You’ll learn why some prescriptions make sleep worse, how to talk to your doctor about symptoms you’ve ignored, and what tests actually matter. No fluff. No guesswork. Just what works when your body won’t let you rest.
Polysomnography is the most comprehensive sleep study used to diagnose sleep disorders like sleep apnea, narcolepsy, and parasomnias. Learn what happens during the test, how results are interpreted, and why it's still the gold standard.
