Best APAP for camping/ backpacking

[colomom]

Brief history:
Not a total newbie to the world of sleep apnea, my son has been using an APAP for over a year (the equipment listed in my profile is my son's).
I suspected that I may have sleep apnea and was finally able to convince my PCP to order overnight oximetry to investigate. The oximetry wasn't pretty (ODI 35, basal O2 88.8%, <88% 137 min, <80% 11 min). The pulmonologist I recently followed up with told me that based on the oximetry he was certain that I have severe sleep apnea, I am scheduled to do an in home sleep study in a little over a week for an official diagnosis. Once the sleep study results come in the doc plans to order an APAP and will follow up in 30 days to titrate based on the machine's readings.

I love the camping and the outdoors and am a Boy Scout leader. Camping for me is generally backpacking in Colorado at high elevations (sleeping at 7,000-12,000 feet). I have searched the forum on this topic and quickly become overwhelmed by the wonderful, detailed information; it is to much for my mind to comprehend at this time.
So to my question:
What is the best primary APAP machine for backpacking/ camping? At this point I am overwhelmed by reading about battery options, but my main takeaway is it will be expensive. APAPs aren't that heavy so I don't plan to invest hundreds of dollars in a travel machine to shave off a little bit of weight.
The only machine I have experience with is my son's Dreamstation. It appears to be lighter than the Resmed, but it seems most users prefer Resmed over Respironics. I've read that removing the humidifier helps with conserving power, when we've tried running my son's Dreamstaion without the humidifier it is quite loud, is the Resmed machine any quieter than the dreamstaion without the humidifier?

Considering I hope to use my APAP machine for backpacking what is the best choice of machine for me?

[Pugsy]

The ResMed AirSense 10 models have the humidifier built in and there's not much of a size savings to remove the water chamber.
What can be done when camping with the ResMed units or even the Respironics units (which is quieter with the humidifier attached) is go ahead an just put some water in the chamber (or leave it dry) but don't turn on any heat to the chamber. Just turn off the humidifier so power is conserved but you can still get a little moisture from the air going over the water (we call it passover humidity) and you can still get the benefit of the humidifier parts acting like a muffler.

Respironics machines are already 12 volt so you don't need much to get them to run off a batter.

ResMed machines are 24 volt and you have to buy and use a little converter to run off a battery...unless you buy one of those high dollar battery kits specifically designed for ResMed machines.
Most ResMed users will opt to get the little converter. It's not cheap but it's a whole lot less than one of the special batteries designed for ResMed machines and between the converter and a less expensive battery..you save some money.

[booksfan]

Brief history:
Not a total newbie to the world of sleep apnea, my son has been using an APAP for over a year (the equipment listed in my profile is my son's).
I suspected that I may have sleep apnea and was finally able to convince my PCP to order overnight oximetry to investigate. The oximetry wasn't pretty (ODI 35, basal O2 88.8%, <88% 137 min, <80% 11 min). The pulmonologist I recently followed up with told me that based on the oximetry he was certain that I have severe sleep apnea, I am scheduled to do an in home sleep study in a little over a week for an official diagnosis. Once the sleep study results come in the doc plans to order an APAP and will follow up in 30 days to titrate based on the machine's readings.

I love the camping and the outdoors and am a Boy Scout leader. Camping for me is generally backpacking in Colorado at high elevations (sleeping at 7,000-12,000 feet). I have searched the forum on this topic and quickly become overwhelmed by the wonderful, detailed information; it is to much for my mind to comprehend at this time.
So to my question:
What is the best primary APAP machine for backpacking/ camping? At this point I am overwhelmed by reading about battery options, but my main takeaway is it will be expensive. APAPs aren't that heavy so I don't plan to invest hundreds of dollars in a travel machine to shave off a little bit of weight.
The only machine I have experience with is my son's Dreamstation. It appears to be lighter than the Resmed, but it seems most users prefer Resmed over Respironics. I've read that removing the humidifier helps with conserving power, when we've tried running my son's Dreamstaion without the humidifier it is quite loud, is the Resmed machine any quieter than the dreamstaion without the humidifier?

Considering I hope to use my APAP machine for backpacking what is the best choice of machine for me?

My husband and I both use AirSense 10 Autosets (I use the For Her model). I use the humidifier, he does not..he has the panel instead. He has never used the humidifier. Both machines are absolutely silent. When I got my machine about 15 months ago, I thought I wanted the Dreamstation, for a variety of reasons. My DME set me up with it and I was pleased, in his office, with how quiet it was. Then he asked if I would like to try the AirSense for Her, since he had that one too. I figured I might as well. I was shocked! The Dreamstation WAS quiet, but the AirSense was SILENT! And that was what I went with. Maybe your DME would be able to let you do a comparison as well?

[Goofproof]

Brief history:
Not a total newbie to the world of sleep apnea, my son has been using an APAP for over a year (the equipment listed in my profile is my son's).
I suspected that I may have sleep apnea and was finally able to convince my PCP to order overnight oximetry to investigate. The oximetry wasn't pretty (ODI 35, basal O2 88.8%, <88% 137 min, <80% 11 min). The pulmonologist I recently followed up with told me that based on the oximetry he was certain that I have severe sleep apnea, I am scheduled to do an in home sleep study in a little over a week for an official diagnosis. Once the sleep study results come in the doc plans to order an APAP and will follow up in 30 days to titrate based on the machine's readings.

I love the camping and the outdoors and am a Boy Scout leader. Camping for me is generally backpacking in Colorado at high elevations (sleeping at 7,000-12,000 feet). I have searched the forum on this topic and quickly become overwhelmed by the wonderful, detailed information; it is to much for my mind to comprehend at this time.
So to my question:
What is the best primary APAP machine for backpacking/ camping? At this point I am overwhelmed by reading about battery options, but my main takeaway is it will be expensive. APAPs aren't that heavy so I don't plan to invest hundreds of dollars in a travel machine to shave off a little bit of weight.
The only machine I have experience with is my son's Dreamstation. It appears to be lighter than the Resmed, but it seems most users prefer Resmed over Respironics. I've read that removing the humidifier helps with conserving power, when we've tried running my son's Dreamstaion without the humidifier it is quite loud, is the Resmed machine any quieter than the dreamstaion without the humidifier?

Considering I hope to use my APAP machine for backpacking what is the best choice of machine for me?

My husband and I both use AirSense 10 Autosets (I use the For Her model). I use the humidifier, he does not..he has the panel instead. He has never used the humidifier. Both machines are absolutely silent. When I got my machine about 15 months ago, I thought I wanted the Dreamstation, for a variety of reasons. My DME set me up with it and I was pleased, in his office, with how quiet it was. Then he asked if I would like to try the AirSense for Her, since he had that one too. I figured I might as well. I was shocked! The Dreamstation WAS quiet, but the AirSense was SILENT! And that was what I went with. Maybe your DME would be able to let you do a comparison as well?

If you run it on 12 Volts D/C, it will be even quieter. Jim Resmed takes 24 Volts to run.

[palerider]

The only machine I have experience with is my son's Dreamstation. It appears to be lighter than the Resmed, but it seems most users prefer Resmed over Respironics. I've read that removing the humidifier helps with conserving power, when we've tried running my son's Dreamstaion without the humidifier it is quite loud, is the Resmed machine any quieter than the dreamstaion without the humidifier?

Considering I hope to use my APAP machine for backpacking what is the best choice of machine for me?

You don't have to remove the humidifier, just turn it off.

The Resmeds are quieter than the Dreamstations (not by a lot of decibels, but the sound they make is typically less noticeable.

They also provide superior treatment, which should be your *primary* consideration for a primary machine.

[Rob K]

There's not a good backpacking option out there right now. It can be done, but with a good deal of effort. The problem is the battery. It takes quite a bit of juice to run these machines. Your lugging around a bunch of batteries. You can charge with solar, but getting the proper amount of sun is a crap shoot. I'd love to have an ultralight setup for the back country. I now limit myself to car camping and do day trips into the back country. Hopefully someday we will have a good option that will get us out in remote locations for extended periods.

From what I've heard people will use a small battery for a night or two, but that's about it.

[palerider]

Batteries these days are either (relatively) cheap and heavy, or expensive and light.

[Chris8243]

If you get this figured out, and take your CPAP backpacking, please post a follow-up on what you did. I've given up backpacking because I'm not gonna lug around batteries plus the CPAP machine. On the bright side, we bought a little camper and I have power so I can still go camping. If you find a backcountry solution, please share!

[CapnLoki]

There's really no question- a Dreamstation is superior to a AirSense for battery use. Aside from being smaller it is much more efficient - about half the power - so that a pack that will run a AirSense for one night will run a DreamStation for 2 nights. And the ResMed needs an extra power converter.

That said, if you really want to go off grid, search for "Kilimanjaro" one poster built custom powerpacks to run a small travel unit (Z1?) for the climb!

[sburke91]

Pricy, but the Airmini, Medistrom battery, and a good solar setup would be a good, and reasonably light, combo. Based on my air travel experiences, you can squeeze a couple nights out of a full charge on the Medistrom battery.

[jsmit86]

Another option may be the HDM Z2 Auto.
I don't camp with it, but I can tell you it's hard to beat for portability. Easy to pack into my carry on.
It's not totally silent, but the Z2 is a significant improvement over the previous Z1 model. Read some of the reviews in cpap.com to get some perspective on the unit.
One of the reviews is mine.
I used it for a few days last week in Las Vegas, and the quality of sleep was fine. While it's not as silent as my Resmed unit, I had no problem falling asleep.