Sleep Study Helps Diagnose Sleep Apnea [Joanie Holm]

This video explains how an at-home sleep study can help diagnose sleep apnea and improve long-term health outcomes. It shares a patient’s experience identifying sleep interruptions, starting treatment with an APAP machine, and the benefits of receiving care through a convenient, supportive healthcare system.

  • At-home sleep studies improve access and comfort: Patients can complete testing in their own bed, making it easier to fall asleep and get accurate results.
  • Sleep apnea is identified by breathing interruptions: Frequent pauses in breathing during sleep can significantly reduce sleep quality and oxygen levels.
  • APAP therapy adjusts automatically: The machine detects breathing needs in real time, providing more personalized support than standard CPAP.
  • Treatment is easy to adopt and track: Apps and device feedback help patients monitor usage, mask fit, and sleep quality.
  • Better sleep supports overall health: Treating sleep apnea helps improve oxygen levels, cognitive function, and long-term wellness.

Frequently Asked Questions

A sleep study is a diagnostic test that measures breathing patterns, oxygen levels, and sleep quality to determine if a patient has sleep apnea, a condition where breathing repeatedly stops during sleep.

An at-home sleep study allows patients to sleep in their own bed while wearing monitoring equipment that records breathing events and oxygen levels throughout the night.

CPAP delivers a fixed pressure of air, while APAP automatically adjusts airflow based on real-time breathing needs, offering more personalized support during sleep.

Untreated sleep apnea can lead to low oxygen levels during sleep, poor sleep quality, daytime fatigue, and potential long-term effects on cognitive and cardiovascular health.

Sleep apnea is often diagnosed when a patient experiences multiple breathing interruptions per hour, significantly higher than the normal range of 0–1 events per hour.

Video Transcript

I'm Joanie Holm. I am a retired pediatric nurse practitioner. I've worked in the Avera Brookings Clinic for 40 years, and I am a part time nurse here at the Brookings Health System with cardiac rehab.

What symptoms brought you to see Dr. Smith?

The main thing I noticed was an extreme dry throat. And it went from just my throat's dry to my throat is parched.

How was your at-home sleep study?

It's surprisingly easy to get your answer, and if you don't have sleep apnea, wonderful, if you do, then you've got a solution. You know, you hear a lot about the need for the lab, sleep lab, and it is important for certain people. In this situation if they find that is positive then you can skip the sleep lab so you're in the comfort of your own bed, and I think easier to sleep that way.

What were the results of your at-home sleep study?

I had 18 sleep interruptions or sleep events per hour. It's 10 seconds of sleep apnea, of not breathing. So 18 times in an hour when you should have 0 to 1 an hour so you're obviously not getting great sleep.

How was your sleep apnea treated?

It was actually an APAP machine versus a CPAP. And the APAP my understanding is it reads when you need the breath versus just automatically setting it. And so it's a little more sophisticated.

How was the transition to sleeping with the APAP machine?

Super easy transition. I have an app that talks about your use, and it tells how many times you take the mask off, you know, if you have events, if you have a good seal, all of those things. And I've been 99% to 100% from the first night. I slept with it on. It just doesn't bothered me. I went into it super positive and I would certainly encourage people to do that. You often, often, often hear about the sleep apnea machine living under the bed. And, as soon as I heard the diagnosis, I just immediately had a very positive mental reaction of, "Wow, this is gonna be helpful." And I haven't taken it off once in the night.

How do you setup your APAP machine?

So the machine itself is really pretty easy to use, pretty cool. So, this is the entire brains of it, you put some distilled water in here. The tubing comes off for packing, but you just pop it back on. As you can see the tubing's super long so in bed you can just flip over and I don't even notice it really. Occasionally, just the position of my arms, I have to reposition so that I'm not crimping it or something, but it really isn't a problem. And you put the mask on over your head. And I mentioned that mine is just a nasal mask, and then I just hook the oxygen tubing onto the front of it. So this is the process, and then I can flip over. I just click it on. You don't feel it, and, oh, I forgot to mention it's silent, absolutely 100% silent. It doesn't have any big breathing sounds that's gonna bother your partner or bother you. And then the other thing that's cool is there is an app that goes with the machine, and it tells me how I've done during the night. I use the machine for 7 hours and 15 minutes. My mask seal was perfect 20 out of 20. I had 0.8 events per hour and in my sleep study had 18 events in an hour, so less than 1 per hour, which is really pretty normal. Everybody has some sleep events. But it's very reassuring to know that it's working.

Why would you recommend Brookings Health System for treating sleep apnea?

If I continue to have the low oxygen levels that I had on my night, which, you know, how long has that been happening, we don't know. But it would definitely have an effect on my cognitive ability if I was running low oxygen all the time. So knowing that my oxygen level stays up is huge. I wanna stay alive for my poor kids, they lost their dad recently. I need to be there, I wanna be there. But, yeah, I think, in the long run, I'm gonna be around for my children, because I'm taking care of myself.

Are you one of Brookings Health System's grateful patients who would like to give back to us? Learn more about how you can give back at brookingshealth.org/MyThanks.

Related Info