Can Apple Watch detect sleep apnea?
The powerful third-party sleep tracking app for Apple Watch, NapBot, is releasing a major update today. It now supports Sleep Apnea analysis, which is a sleep disorder in which pauses in breathing or period of shallow breathing during sleep occur more often than usual.
Now, with watchOS 8, you can also track your respiratory rate throughout the night, which could help to detect early signs of medical conditions like sleep apnea, and chronic lung disease, among others. Using its built-in accelerometer, the Apple Watch can track the number of breaths you take per minute while asleep.
ApneaTracker is based entirely on the features of an Android smart device; hence, the user does not need any additional devices. The app is suitable for anyone who suspects they may be suffering from the symptoms of sleep apnea, or who simply wants to follow their sleep.
With Apple Watch Series 3 or later with watchOS 8, you can measure and track your Respiratory Rate. * With Track Sleep with Apple Watch turned on, when you wear your Apple Watch to bed, it will automatically measure and record the number of times you breathe in a minute.
Many modern CPAP machines now include sleep tracking functions, but that only helps if you've already been diagnosed with sleep apnea. However, wrist trackers such as Fitbit or the Apple Watch may be able to clue you in on your sleep quality and even track sleep apnea.
Not all snorers have OSA, but if snoring is accompanied by any of the following symptoms, it may be an indication to see a doctor for further evaluation for OSA: Witnessed breathing pauses during sleep. Excessive daytime sleepiness. Difficulty concentrating.
AHI of 5–15 indicates mild OSA; 15–30, moderate; and over 30, severe [5]. Sleep respiratory rate (RR) is an important indicator for serious illness [6], especially for OSA monitoring.
SnoreLab: Record Snoring
This app tracks and measures how loud your snoring is, one of the most common sleep apnea symptoms. It can also integrate with the Apple Health app to record your sleep statistics. What's interesting is that you can playback and listen to your snoring because it records it.
DIY tests are administered in the comfort of your own home and bed, which helps to eliminate some anxiety and discomfort you may experience at a sleep lab. You simply affix the finger oxygen probe, chest belt, and nasal tube before hitting the pillow.
Tests to detect sleep apnea include: Nocturnal polysomnography. During this test, you're hooked up to equipment that monitors your heart, lung and brain activity, breathing patterns, arm and leg movements, and blood oxygen levels while you sleep.
How do I use sleep apnea with Apple Watch?
- Open the Health app on your iPhone, tap Browse, then tap Respiratory.
- Tap Respiratory Rate, then tap Show More Respiratory Rate Data.
- The Sleep entry shows the range of your respiratory rate as you've slept.
Sleep apnea sounds like snoring, but the vital difference is in your breathing patterns. With sleep apnea, your breathing can halt for seconds at a time, and the breaths you take tend to become shallow. These pauses can range from 10 seconds to 1 minute in severe cases.
Using the Apple Watch's Taptic Engine, Sleep Cycle can give your wrist a subtle (and silent) tap when the iPhone app detects that you're snoring. The tap is subtle enough that it shouldn't wake you, Sleep Cycle says, but it should prompt you to change positions which can help you stop snoring.
Sleep apnea is a serious sleep disorder. People who have sleep apnea stop breathing for 10 to 30 seconds at a time while they are sleeping. These short stops in breathing can happen up to 400 times every night.
Apple WatchOS 9's New Features Include Sleep Tracking, Medication Reminders. WatchOS 9 can detect REM, core and deep sleep, as well as offer heart health support and prompt you to take meds.
Sleeping on the left side
It's by far the most effective sleep position to help control sleep apnea. It's considered to encourage blood flow, reduce snoring and calm sleep apnea. In fact, research points out that left side-sleepers experience less severe sleep apnea occurrences.
It's not officially a cure for sleep apnea – in fact, nothing is – but losing weight is almost always the first piece of advice given to those with signs of sleep apnea such as drowsiness, fatigue, snoring, and so on.
Does Sleep Apnea Ever Just Disappear? In general, obstructive sleep apnea is a chronic condition that does not go away on its own. This is especially true if you are an adult, as your anatomy tends to remain fixed from adolescence onwards.
You wake up enough to take a few breaths, but not enough to remember it the next morning. This cycle repeats itself many times each night, making you feel tired or exhausted in the morning. When you have OSA the apnea is caused by an obstruction or blockage.
My respiratory sleep data from the Apple Watch consistently average just over 15 breaths/min or just less than 4 seconds per breath. I've used HRV4Biofeedback software to determine my resonant breathing frequency. Essentially that is the breathing rate that matches the best HRV reading with the highest rMSSD.
What happens to your heart rate during sleep apnea?
When you stop breathing, your heart rate also tends to drop the longer your body is deprived of oxygen. Then, your involuntary reflexes cause you to startle awake at the end of that period of not breathing. When this occurs, your heart rate tends to accelerate quickly and your blood pressure rises.
Though sleep apnea is a reversible thing, you can control it, you can treat it, you can live a normal life with it, but if we do not treat it, we fail to diagnose it, then it leads to heart failure and stroke and we know these things are irreversible.
Using the Apple Watch's Taptic Engine, Sleep Cycle can give your wrist a subtle (and silent) tap when the iPhone app detects that you're snoring. The tap is subtle enough that it shouldn't wake you, Sleep Cycle says, but it should prompt you to change positions which can help you stop snoring.
Both studies reported that smartphone pulse oximeters were accurate. These data corroborate with our study that demonstrated that despite a tendency to present higher values, when compared to conventional oximetry devices, the Apple Watch device was accurate and similar.
My respiratory sleep data from the Apple Watch consistently average just over 15 breaths/min or just less than 4 seconds per breath. I've used HRV4Biofeedback software to determine my resonant breathing frequency. Essentially that is the breathing rate that matches the best HRV reading with the highest rMSSD.
No, the Apple Watch will not call 911 if your heart stops. The Apple Watch can alert you to high or low heart rates and irregular heart rhythms through its notifications feature, but it cannot detect a heart attack or alert someone if your heart stops.
