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<\/div>Martin Parr\/Magnum Photos<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n
It has ruined many a night\u2019s sleep, and no doubt a lot of relationships too. Trying to sleep next to a snoring partner is exactly that: trying. Once the engines fire up, there are few countermeasures besides a shove, earplugs and the patience of a saint.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the thing about snoring: many of us consider it to be little more than an embarrassment or an annoyance and grudgingly put up with it. But accumulating findings suggest that this trivialises an important, and common, health problem.<\/p>\n
Snoring isn\u2019t just associated with broken sleep, it can be a warning sign of trouble ahead and also appears to have some potentially serious impacts on the snorer\u2019s cardiovascular system. Despite a proliferation of remedies, there is a paucity of evidence about what works. But as sleep researchers increasingly wake up to the hidden dangers of snoring, there is hope the nightmare will soon end.<\/p>\n
Snoring is very common, though getting a handle on exactly how common is difficult. Many snorers are blissfully unaware that they do it. \u201cIf you ask someone \u2018Do you snore?\u2019, they\u2019ll say \u2018I dunno, I\u2019m sleeping\u2019, \u201d says Danny Eckert<\/a>, director of sleep health at Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute in Adelaide, Australia. \u201cTheir bed partner might tell them, but a lot of people don\u2019t have a bed partner.\u201d In Eckert\u2019s experience, however, it is rampant.\u2026<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n