Treatment of obstructive sleep apnea with a simple CPAP device

CPAP is the "gold standard" treatment for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Current CPAP models have developed additional functions including automatic CPAP and pressure relief. However, CPAP adherence has not improved over the last three decades. Many patients in low-income countries cannot afford these CPAP devices. A novel simple CPAP device with a fixed pressure without pressure controller was developed.

Manual CPAP pressure titration was performed in 127 patients with OSA. Six patients with a titration pressure higher than 11 cmH₂O and 14 patients who could not tolerate CPAP were excluded, leaving 107 participating in the following 2 studies. In study one, 54 of 107 patients were treated by both conventional fixed CPAP and simple CPAP in random order. In the second study, another 53 patients were treated by both autoCPAP in automatic function and simple CPAP in random order. Simple CPAP was fixed at 10 cmH₂O, 8 cmH₂O, and 6 cmH₂O for patients whose titration pressure was between 9-10, 7-8, and ≤ 6 cmH₂O, respectively. Conventional fixed CPAP device was set exactly the same as manual titration pressure.

All patients whose manual titration pressure ≤ 10 cmH₂O were effectively treated by simple CPAP (AHI 40.7 ± 2.3 events/h before vs 2.5 ± 0.3 events/h after, p < 0.001). Patients expressed similar preferences for simple CPAP, autoCPAP, and conventional fixed CPAP (p > 0.05).

We conclude that a novel simple CPAP is an alternative treatment for most patients with OSA, which may widen access to CPAP therapy in the developing countries because of its low cost.