According to the American Sleep Apnea Association long term CPAP compliance rates continue to languish at 50-60%. Its clear that plenty of people have a hard time complying with their CPAP treatment. Let me share with you one of the techniques I used to learn about myself and the difficulties I have with CPAP.

I started a spreadsheet. Every day I entered some basic details into it about the previous night’s sleep: the date, the total hours spent on the machine, the actual number of hours spent in the bedroom, and the number of times I put the mask on. I augmented these columns with some formulas to keep track of recent compliance.

So how did I keep track of all of this info every day? Every CPAP machine these days provides all sorts of measurements. My CPAP, and I think every machine made today keeps track of the total number of hours of sleep logged. The number of hours you slept last night is just today’s total hour count minus yesterday’s total hour count.

Now the machine can’t do it all for you. I also kept track of when I entered the bedroom. Not down the minute mind you. But I’d get it down to the nearest 15 minutes, e.g. 12:30am, 11:45pm. And I’d keep track of the times I put the mask on in my head.

This info helps you in a couple of different ways. You can correlate your nightly sleep totals with various environmental variables: bedroom temperature, the time you went to bed, the sheets you are using, etc. This will definitely help you increase CPAP compliance.

But there is another, more subtle benefit of detailed daily record keeping. I’m talking about the simple ability to keep the mask on. When you dedicate yourself to analyzing your sleep you become a detached observer of your own behavior. It becomes much easier to deal with any fears you have towards your sleep machine when you get caught up in keeping track of all that data.

Gradually my fears of the CPAP mask receded because I was so preoccupied with diligently measuring my nightly sleep numbers. I didn’t have the time or energy to indulge my phobias. Plus it made me more aggressive in putting the mask back on in the middle of the night: I needed not just the sleep, but more numbers for my study. And over time the repeated wearing of the mask wore down my mild - and to my mind perfectly natural - claustrophobia.

So open up Excel and get cracking. Don’t have Microsoft Office? Or go to Open Office and download their free software. Do you have a GMail account? Then try clicking that link labeled “Documents” up at the very top of your browser window. The fine folks at Google have provided not just a web-enabled word processor, but a spreadsheet facility as well.?

You need to know that you can beat sleep apnea, and that keeping a daily record of your progress will give you both the information and confidence you need to benefit from CPAP. Believe me, if I can do it you can do it. Take your life back!