REM and Sleep Stage Tracking at Home

[Spy Car]

As one who suffers from periods of insomnia, and who would not have guessed he had sleep apnea (but does), I'd be very interested in a device that could accurately (and cost effectively) monitor sleep/REM. Not sure the technology is there yet. But it seems like a matter of time.

Bill

[eseedhouse]

These three devices in provide insight using different techniques that hare been proven superior to the devices that primarily use actigraphy, which actually also earned its own chapter (124) in the "Principles and Practice of Sleep Medicine" text book.

Textbooks do not necessarily have accurate information. Show me a study published in a respected peer reviewed medical journal and subsequently replicated and I might be interested. But not until then, thanks.

[PaulaO2]

There is a difference between sleep docs not trusting/believing in the algorithms of modern xPAPs and that only PSGs can detect sleep stages. It is true a lot of sleep docs do not trust CPAP data. Many of us have docs that don't believe in APAPs. Many more have docs that never look at the sleep data. We feel that is like an endocrinologist never looking at a diabetic's glucose meter results.

Yes, many of us seek to get the best care we can, even if that care and treatment is from ourselves and our own research. And our own pockets. Which is why I am adamantly critical of the devices you mention. If all I read are pretty words about how it will help my sleep but yet it doesn't tell me HOW it will help my sleep, then it isn't going to help my sleep.

The Dreem sounds like it uses an audio pattern technology that has been around for a while called binaural beats. I have several CDs that use it under the trade name of Hemi-Sync. I have to be careful, though, as some of them give me headaches and/or cause my heart to race. I would hesitate to use this in my sleep and would encourage anyone to make sure the company has a return policy before purchasing.

[natyprueba]

Nope. None of these devices can tell what sleep stage you are in unless they do the following:

track your eye movement
and/or
are attached to your head to track brain activity

Hello.
-I respect your opinion and partially agree with you.
-You can have and indirect measure of what is going on with your sleep quality. I am talking about your heart beats. I use almost every day an Oximeter CMD 50D+ and I have seen that when I am in deep sleep my bpm goes down to 55-60, when I am awake and 100% resting the bpm minimum is 65-70.
I measure my bpm with a very cheap chinese wristband (A88) you can buy it in eBay for around $25.00 bucks and wait 25 days to arrive from China.
I tested with myself (I am using CPAP):6.5 hours deep sleep +1/2 hour light sleep. My wife will begin CPAP because she is in trouble too. I tested the A88 with her and she got: 4.5 hours deep sleep+ 1 hour light sleep.
I don' t have medical education, I am only trying to understand this new world for me. I think that Ahi is a good indicator of your sleep quality, but better indicator is the SpO in your blood and the CMD 50+ I believe is the champion because price+realibility+low error.
In this case the use of the wristband give you information about your sleep quality with out go to the lab and expend $1500.00 bucks in the test, and you can do it at home with out too much trouble, because you can sleep very easy with the wrist band.
I think it is another way to find out about your sleep quality.
Ralph.

[robertbuckley]

I appreciate what rwelliot is saying, and have been on a bit of a similar pilgrimage myself for a number of years trying to determine what is going on in the brain and what is out there to help track it. I I think he has been very even handed in writing about the different products, not running an advertisement. I have apnea, both obstructive and central. I have very interrupted sleep - the "arousals" (I wish they used another term of art) - but that awaken me fully. And Alpha wave intrusions. In short, I don't get enough good sleep, and the good doctor and I have backed into believing not enough REM. BUT, without sleeping in the lab or doing a home PSG for multiple nights you can not really get a full handle on it. So the search for how to gather objective data over more than one night begins. I am not going to go through all the devices already mentioned, but each has a place in trying to get at the knowledge we want, but mainly through what I might term secondary information. The Zeo may have come closest, but was never medically validated, the Dreem may also. I would really like to have a device that accurately and directly measured the brain's activity. Am I in stage 1,2,3,REM? - and then go correlate that with my PAP wave form data and my heart rate and O2 levels. What is going on in that old noggin of mine? There seem to be some new devices coming on line that use algorithms with single channel sensors that will be in the consumer price range, but not quite there yet. And interestingly, the sleep labs are not interested in playing with them in conjunction with their PSG studies to validate them (economics!). So we wait, and someday somebody will put one out there, maybe a venture capitalist with sleep apnea and more money to burn then sense. Wish I was him!

[DebJ]

Hi there,
did you end up figuring out why you kept waking up and manage to find some sort of treatment to prevent this?  I have the exact same problem. I'm trailing Xyrem right now, it knocks me out, but my brain must get used to it and eventually keeps waking itself. Most of the awakenings I don't even know are happening, but the PSG sure showed it! 17 awakenings and 19 mins deep sleep.  First week I was on Xyrem, I felt better than I had in years. Then the efficacy wore off. 

What the heck is wrong with us?  I have mild hypopnea. I look at my CPAP data trying to figure out if I get deep sleep or not. I can't.