Snoring can cause damage to your arteries.
In other sections it was discussed that children can have “benign primary snoring” and that the lymphoid tissue (tonsils and adenoids) may reduce in size as the airway matures, and the snoring may go away. Not so true in adults.
Snoring is a vibration of the soft tissues in the airway passages. This vibration can cause inflammation, and even trauma to the cells in the surrounding arteries. Of which the carotid artery happens to be close to the airway passages. The carotid artery provides blood flow to your brain, and if they are clogged from atherosclerosis this can lead to milder symptoms such as headaches or more severe symptoms such as stroke.
Snoring and Carotid Atherosclerosis:
Snoring originates in upper airway and results in vibrations of the pharyngeal wall and associated structures. Vibratory stimuli leads to damage to arterial wall endothelial cells. The proximity of the carotid bifurcation to the pharyngeal wall leads to exposure the vibrations resulting in pathologic damage to the arterial endothelium. (Puig; SLEEP 2005) (Hedner; Sleep and Breathing 1994)
Further supported by findings of simultaneous quantification revealing significant increase in carotid artery atherosclerosis with heavy snoring, but not in femoral atherosclerosis (Lee; SLEEP 2008).
