Worldwide, hundreds of millions of people are suffering from sleep disorder problems. Obstructive Sleep Apnea(OSA) is a sleep disorder in which people repeatedly stop breathing during sleep. It is caused by muscle relaxation during sleep, and the breathing can be obstructed. Such effort may wake up the sufferer and makes sleeping of low-quality or even totally deprived. The blood oxygen level decreases, blood pressure rises and sometimes heart beats irregularly which may cause cardiovascular problems and even deaths.

CPAP is the most safe and effective treatment for OSA. The CPAP machine blows air at a prescribed pressure. The CPAP systems used for OSA treatment are usually based on a blower and an exhalation port (intended leak orifice). The blower takes room air and generates a constant airflow through a flexible tubing. The instrument taken up for development can be used in hospitals and at home in case of:
• sleep apnea
• Respiratory failure
• Airway obstruction (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorders)
• To prevent the need for tracheal intubation(During ventilators usage)

The instrument differs from the market design by its technical sophistications and lowest affordable price.

Novelty of the proposed design:
• Adjusts pressure automatically based on monitoring of apnea and snoring events
• Use of Peltier element in the humidifier
• Heating element with “feedback” to control condensation on the hose
• Battery operated system
• Embedding of Sensor wires within the hose
• Touch based capacitive switches provided in mask for easy accessibility
• Incorporation of NEBULIZER with CPAP
• Smart card data transfer
• Alerting feature on Unintentional removal of CPAP mask

Proposed Technique

The design utilizes the integrated type heated humidifier. It replaces the conventional heating element of cpap humidifier with “ peltier module.” This provides an advantage of performing heating and Cooling based on the real time temperature. Also it relatively consumes lesser power than the existing heating methods. PID (propotional,integral,derivative) controller and the technique of pulse width modulation (PWM) to exert an accurate control over the humidity parameters.

Brushless DC motor is employed in our proposed design, which relies on a electronic controlled commutation.

MARKET:
There is a huge market for CPAP machines among hospitals and households. But the price of CPAP is upto $3500 (approx) which a common man cannot afford. The proposed design reduces the cost upto $600 with the same accurate and effective performance with state-of–art design methods. Also effective pressure feedback system automatically changes the required pressure to the patient which is contrary to the conventional CPAP modules that delivers air at a constant level to the patient.

Benefits of Using CPAP
• Avoids the trauma associated with intubation and the complications associated with artificial airways
• Reduces the risk of ventilator associated pneumonia
• Reduces the risk of ventilator induced lung injury
• Provides ventilatory assistance with greater comfort, convenience and less cost than invasive ventilation
• Reduces requirements for heavy sedation
• Helps COPD (Common Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) patients by reducing breathing impedence.