Positive Airway Pressure Device Technology Past and Present: What's in the "Black Box"?

Since the introduction of continuous positive airway pressure (PAP) for the treatment of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) in 1981, PAP technology has diversified exponentially. Compact and quiet fixed continuous PAP flow generators, autotitrating PAP devices, and bilevel PAP devices that can treat multiple sleep-disordered breathing phenotypes including OSA, central sleep apnea (CSA), combinations of OSA and CSA, and hypoventilation are available. Adaptive servo-ventilators can suppress Hunter-Cheyne-Stokes breathing and CSA and treat coexisting obstructive events. Volume-assured pressure support PAP apparatus purports to provide a targeted degree of ventilatory assistance while also treating cooccurring OSA and/or CSA.