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Perhaps most Hong Kong people have already heard of sleep apnea. As the name suggests, "sleep apnea" is a breathing disorder related to sleep. For patients who suffer from sleep apnea, their upper respiratory tracts may be obstructed due to various conditions. Sometimes the patients' breathing command could be affected by problems in the central nervous system, which would result in repeated suffocation during sleep. As this reduces the oxygen content of the blood, patients would suddenly wake up to take normal breaths and then fall back into sleep. Since the condition makes it difficult for patients to enter a deep sleep state and gain sufficient rest, their health and energy level during the day could take a toll.

Traditional Chinese Medicine considers our sleeping cycle as a vibrant and constitutive physiological process with the characteristic postulation of vital energy (qi), yin and yang to explain the sleeping pattern. The vital energy inside the body has a specified route and course to flow daily. The energy cycle governs the sleep-wake cycle in conjunction with yin and yang. The continual daily succession of yin and yang in the nature determines the sleep rhythm in our body. When yang energy is dominant, it helps keep you awake. On the other hand, when yin energy is abundant, it helps you sleep. If the yang energy is not interacting with the yin energy, or the internal yin and yang balance has been disturbed, you may become excessively excited leading to insomnia, which is presented as the inability to obtain sufficient sleep, difficulty falling asleep or being unable to asleep throughout the night.

Insomnia is a feeling of not being able to get enough sleep. This is related to finding it hard to get to sleep, waking up without having...