Ever wondered if you might suffer from sleep apnea, but you have never taken an official test to find out? Apple announced that Sleep Apnea notifications would be coming to its Apple Watch Series 9 and 10 and Ultra 2 smartwatches, and now, that feature is officially available for Canadian users.
First, what is sleep apnea? It’s a potentially serious condition where breathing stops repeatedly during sleep. The condition, which is estimated to impact more than one billion people worldwide, goes undiagnosed in most cases, according to Apple. If left untreated, sleep apnea can have important consequences on health, including an increased risk of hypertension, Type 2 diabetes, and cardiac issues.
The Sleep Apnea notification feature, which has received a Medical Device License from Health Canada, is designed for those 18 and older who have never had an actual diagnosis but believe they may suffer from such sleep disturbances. The Watch uses the accelerometer to monitor small movements at the wrist that are associated with interruptions in normal respiratory patterns, which Apple labels as Breathing Disturbances. Some can be normal but if they occur frequently over multiple nights, it’s an indication that it could be sleep apnea.
View nightly Breathing Disturbances in the Health app on iPhone and iPad and see if they are classified as elevated or not elevated. View these over a one-, six-, or one-year period. It takes 30 days for enough data to be acquired to analyze after which you may receive a notification is consistent signs of moderate to severe sleep apnea are detected. The information will include the time period when potential sleep apnea occurred along with educational materials.
From there, you can decide to seek further assistance from a medical professional. You can also download the data from the Watch to a PDF to share with your health care provider to discuss potential next steps.
The notification algorithm was developed using advanced machine learning and an extensive data set of clinical-grade sleep apnea tests. The feature was then validated in a clinical study where every participant identified by the algorithm had at least mild sleep apnea.
To set up Sleep Apnea notifications, open the Apple Health app on your iPhone or iPad. Go to the Browse app on the bottom, right of the menu. Scroll down to Respiratory and select. You’ll see the option for Sleep Apnea notifications. Answer the questions to confirm you are over the age of 18 and have not been diagnosed with sleep apnea, read through the explanation, and it’s all set up to start tracking.
While I personally have not been diagnoses with sleep apnea nor do I suspect I suffer from it, I have turned the feature on to test it out and will be able to report back in 30 days, along with my detailed Apple Watch Series 10 review.