How many hours of sleep monitoring

[DeannaPap]

Is there a minimum amount of sleep during a sleep study that is required to be properly diagnosed with sleep apnea?

Let's say someone slept only two hours during the study? Is that enough?

[Julie]

Should be, though it often depends on the lab (their equipment, attitude, etc). And people notoriously swear they've only slept e.g. 4 hrs when in fact they were out for 6.

And Deanna, please try to get all your questions in one note so we can connect the dots and make sense of them for you.

[DeannaPap]

I'm more wondering how many hours it should take to properly diagnose it? Minimum. I'm assuming there is a standard? And I would think there are different levels of sleep so you may breath differently and so on when you've been sleeping for a few hours?

[zoocrewphoto]

I'm more wondering how many hours it should take to properly diagnose it? Minimum. I'm assuming there is a standard? And I would think there are different levels of sleep so you may breath differently and so on when you've been sleeping for a few hours?

It really depends on how severe you are, and how well you sleep.

For example, I am severe enough that I met criteria in less than 2 1/2 hours to move to the titration phase. I never reached deep sleep or REM. But I was already at 79 ahi. So, if you are severe enough, fast enough to allow for a titration the same night, they can do that.

If somebody is mild or only bad when on their back or in REM, it may take more time to get a really accurate study. Somebody who is moderate may have results in the mild range if they didn't sleep enough to get full data. So, a shorter night may give you a milder result or a false negative. I suspect if I had done a full night of diagnosis, I would have been over 100 ahi. But I am glad to have done it all in one night. And severe is severe. I definitely proved I needed cpap.