Snorers find it difficult to remember details such as the names of people and the houses in which they lived.

Snorers may think that they do not face bigger problems than a sometimes angry spouse.

But if you snore, it might be harder to remember past memories of your life.

People with obstructive sleep apnea, one of the leading causes of snoring, have a worse memory of years past.

They have trouble remembering specific details, such as the names of colleagues or the street number and the street in which they lived.

Whenever a person with sleep apnea snores, his throat contracts to block his airways, which also cuts oxygen to the brain.

Experts believe that it could destroy the gray matter in the important part of the brain to record memories.

People with obstructive sleep apnea, one of the leading causes of snoring, have worse memories of years and details such as the names of people and the homes in which they lived , reveals a study.

A study conducted among 44 people with sleep apnea, which affects 1.5 million people in Britain and up to one-third of retirees, revealed that they had good memories. worse for life from the beginning of adulthood.

When invited to tell their personal stories, more than half had "too general" memories, where they had trouble remembering details.

For healthy people the same age, less than one in five had this problem, most being able to provide detailed memories.

Dr. Melinda Jackson, head of study at RMIT University in Australia, said, "Our study suggests that sleep apnea may impair the brain's ability to code or consolidate certain types of sleep. memories of life, which prevents people from remembering the details of the past. & # 39;

She added: "The brain tests of people with sleep apnea show a significant loss of gray matter in areas that overlap the autobiographical memory network."

The researchers recruited people aged 20 to 69 with sleep apnea, which causes snoring and an interruption of sleep when the walls of the throat relax and prevent breathing.

They were asked to recall three memories of their childhood, adult life, and recent life that were judged by the level of detail that people could provide. Their responses were compared to 44 people of the same age who did not suffer from sleep apnea.

When asked if they were young, such as a wedding, the birth of children or the beginning of their career, snoring seemed to affect memory.

People with sleep apnea were less able to remember details, such as addresses and names.

The researchers then gave people replica words, asking them for memories that made them guilty or proud, for example.

These were described as "specific" if they were focused, with exact times and locations, or "too general" if the memory included many events or jumped over a longer period.

This led the study to conclude that 52.3% of people with sleep apnea had a very general memory, recalling at least five generalized memories. This compares to only 18.9% of people released from the disease.

However, people with sleep apnea have not shown any problems remembering episodes in their lives. The details of recent times and childhood have not escaped them either.

People deprived of sleep may have difficulty remembering the beginning of adulthood because it is at that time that their snoring started to affect their brains. Or maybe people with sleep apnea struggle with memories from a distant past.

According to a study published in the Journal of the International Society of Neuropsychology, sleep masks worn by people to open their airways could help improve thinking problems.

Dr. Jackson said, "An important next step will be to determine whether effective sleep apnea therapy can also help counteract some of these memory problems, or even restore lost memories."