Cheyne-Stokes respiration
Cheyne-Stokes respiration is an unusual pattern of breathing that mostly happens during sleep but can sometimes happen while awake. It involves a cycle of fast, shallow breaths, followed by slower, deeper breaths, and then a pause where no breathing occurs (called an apnea). Instead of a full pause, some people might have very shallow breathing, called hypopnea. This pattern usually repeats every 45 to 90 seconds.
Cheyne-Stokes breathing is linked to a condition called central sleep apnea. Unlike obstructive sleep apnea, which happens when something blocks the throat during sleep, central sleep apnea occurs when the brain doesn’t send the right signals to the body to breathe. Cheyne-Stokes breathing happens because of a different kind of problem with how the body controls breathing. Even though they are similar, central sleep apnea and Cheyne-Stokes breathing affect the body in different ways.