Is a CPAP the only way to get a nightly AHI?

[el33]

Home sleep study equipment is apparently not available to the general public.

Or is there a way to buy it and also use the accompanying software?

If not, is a CPAP then really the only way to at least get an AHI without getting a prescription for a home sleep study every single night?

What if you just wanted to see how different sleep positions affect your AHI, or all this other cool data that a CPAP can't even give you (scroll down), as you can with the ResMed ApneaLink used for the studies:

https://www.portea.com/medical-equipmen ... nk-Air.pdf

Perhaps it costs more than it may seem, but I'm not seeing them being offered to the general public at all, not even used.

From what I read, the line seems to be that we're much too dumb to understand the results, in spite of probably many thousands who obviously have it upstairs to understand the intricacies of OSCAR without paying someone to explain.

"Paying a licensed "professional" hundreds to read these studies to you every time is the only way to do it right, and if you're not mature enough to realize that, you're safer just doing without," seems to be the attitude.

[ChicagoGranny]

Home sleep study equipment is apparently not available to the general public.

Here you go. Only $120 - https://www.ebay.com/itm/173561994611

Order immediately. They are selling like hotcakes.

[Julie]

What we/you do is download Oscar (see stickies top of pg), get any old SD card and put it in your machine providing it has a slot (what machine do you use), put the card in your compater daily (not your phone) and get the most comprehensive results available anywhere but an expensive sleep lab - way better than most of the info machine screens give. Also AHI is NOT everything... there's more that matters plus how you feel. But you need a Cpap to TREAT your OSA and keep you alive. You can get cheap ones in various places including the odd person selling here, and refurb 2nd hand ones from a great website, but your machine needs to be one that works with Oscar, so do you have one at all, and if so which model of what brand? And if you post results here experts can advise re what may or may not need tweaking, both with machine and otherwise.

Besides which, if you don't have a machine, what good is knowing your AHI or anything else is up or down if you can't/don't do anything about it?

[el33]

"Here you go. Only $120"

Thanks, I hadn't seen that one before. But is its data comparable to that of the ResMed ApneaLink (which I should have mentioned by name originally - did you scroll through the link?) - and is the ApneaLink legally allowed to be sold to the public? I'm thinking it's not - and I think this would be because it has features which would encroach on the "professionals' " turf.

But maybe I'm too cynical. I'd love to be wrong...

[el33]

"What we/you do is download Oscar..."

Thanks, I have an APAP, and know and use OSCAR already. But did you scroll through the link? The ApneaLink tells you much more that OSCAR can't, so I'm wondering if you can just buy these to begin with.

"what good is knowing your AHI or anything else is up or down if you can't/don't do anything about it?"

If you have OSA, you can often simply sleep in a different position, or at least I can. They're practically shoving CPAP down my throat, but I've found that merely sleeping on a 30 degree incline eliminates my OSA already. My weight is normal, but my tongue is too big, according to the Mallampti scale:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallampati_score

If I sleep flat, it flops backward, on an incline, it falls forward. Simple as that.

I can back this up with OSCAR data from my APAP (if it's restricted to 4 CM H2O, min and max), and also with the Withings Sleep Mat. I can't believe how accurate this $100 mat is in telling me my breathing disturbances at night. In my experience, it correlates with OSCAR's AHI data almost perfectly, but I'm sure it would be illegal for this OTC product to refer to its chart as depicting AHI (but in Europe it apparently can), which kind of ticks me off. How many millions more suffer with fatigue throughout their lives, not knowing that they're just not sleeping right?

They're more like $50-60 on ebay, and I can't say enough good about them.

https://www.withings.com/us/en/sleep

[chunkyfrog]

I see you registered in 2018.
Have you been using a cpap all this time?
Why do you want to know your untreated AHI now?

[el33]

I know my own situation, but now I'm on a crusade.

I'm a selfless soul, you see, always thinking of others...

[chunkyfrog]

I know my own situation, but now I'm on a crusade.

I'm a selfless soul, you see, always thinking of others...

Commendable, but most of us consider changing the system--if possible--
will take too long to benefit anyone currently alive.

[ChicagoGranny]

If I sleep flat, it flops backward, on an incline, it falls forward. Simple as that.

That's the classic definition of obstructive sleep apnea: the tongue and soft palate collapse into the windpipe when the airway muscles relax during sleep. It's not that the tongue is too large. It's that epigenetics has left us with underdeveloped jaws with the result being narrow airways that collapse easily. You are lucky if sleeping at a 30-degree incline resolves your condition. It doesn't for most of us.

But is its data comparable to that of the ResMed ApneaLink (which I should have mentioned by name originally - did you scroll through the link?)

ApneaLink is a five-channel device - respiratory effort, pulse,
oxygen saturation, nasal flow and snoring. The Contec device is three-channel - pulse, oxygen saturation and nasal flow.

But is its data comparable to that of the ResMed ApneaLink - and is the ApneaLink legally allowed to be sold to the public?

No. No.

Home sleep study equipment is apparently not available to the general public.

We can't even get a damn mask without a prescription.

[el33]

"We can't even get a damn mask without a prescription."

You've been at this a lot longer than I have, but I sourced all the peripherals and thought I figured out that all you need a prescription for is the CPAP itself. Otherwise, I'd have thought that ebay and Amazon would have clamped down on their sale.

Also, do you know if we can be prescribed (given permission to buy) an ApneaLink?

The condescending Dr. I went off on mentioned that theoretically we *could* own one (but we'd be too dumb to understand it, so we shouldn't hurt ourselves trying), which gave me some hope. I wish I remembered where I saw this.

I'll have to ask about ownership next time I have an appointment.

Is the Contec device just slipping through the cracks for now, or would it likely not be allowed to be sold here? I've heard there are actually some fake SpO2 monitors, so I hope it really measures what it claims.

If it's legal here, it would lead to another question: exactly where is the line drawn. I.e., what is illegal for us to measure on our own: It can't be pulse or oxygen saturation, probably not snoring, but nasal flow (the Contec has it) and respiratory effort (only the ApneaLink has it)?

[southerndoc]

"We can't even get a damn mask without a prescription."

You've been at this a lot longer than I have, but I sourced all the peripherals and thought I figured out that all you need a prescription for is the CPAP itself. Otherwise, I'd have thought that ebay and Amazon would have clamped down on their sale.

Also, do you know if we can be prescribed (given permission to buy) an ApneaLink?

The condescending Dr. I went off on mentioned that theoretically we *could* own one (but we'd be too dumb to understand it, so we shouldn't hurt ourselves trying), which gave me some hope. I wish I remembered where I saw this.

I'll have to ask about ownership next time I have an appointment.

Is the Contec device just slipping through the cracks for now, or would it likely not be allowed to be sold here? I've heard there are actually some fake SpO2 monitors, so I hope it really measures what it claims.

If it's legal here, it would lead to another question: exactly where is the line drawn. I.e., what is illegal for us to measure on our own: It can't be pulse or oxygen saturation, probably not snoring, but nasal flow (the Contec has it) and respiratory effort (only the ApneaLink has it)?

As a physician, I think that limiting use of such devices is like telling a diabetic they shouldn't be allowed to own a glucometer to check their blood sugar.

Why in the world would you try to restrict somebody from some that assesses their health? Yes, I agree that something invasive should be considered prescription only, but non-invasive monitoring should be available to all.

[el33]

"Why in the world would you try to restrict somebody from some that assesses their health?"

This is a rhetorical question, right?

[el33]

"It's not that the tongue is too large."

In my case, I think that's all there is to it.

I'm new to the stats, but per the article referenced at Wiki:

https://academic.oup.com/sleep/article/29/7/903/2708391

The Mallampati score was an independent predictor of both the presence and severity of obstructive sleep apnea. On average, for every 1-point increase in the Mallampati score, the odds of having obstructive sleep apnea (apnea-hypopnea index ≥ 5) increased more than 2-fold (odds ratio [per 1-point increase] = 2.5; 95% confidence interval: 1.2–5.0; p = .01), and the apnea-hypopnea index increased by more than 5 events per hour (coefficient = 5.2; 95% confidence interval: 0.2–10; p = .04). These results were independent of more than 30 variables that reflected airway anatomy, body habitus, symptoms, and medical history.

[Julie]

Because doctors (present company excepted SD) need to retain both their godliness and their lawyers, who keep them out of court when they screw up info and patients blindly take their word for the info's rightness, then sue for malpractice.

What a world.

[ILoveFlowers]

It seems like most people have to deal with the opposite problem- doctors who insist they just learn to sleep in a different position so their insurance won't have to pay out for a machine that could change their health and their lives. I know they told my son-in-law to sew a tennis ball in the back of his pajama top so he wouldn't sleep on his back. Well, to me that just seems unbelievably cheap. Changing your sleep position is not so easy for many people. And once we're asleep we tend to default to that position our bodies find most comfortable.