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Felix Varela Senior High School
Miami, Fla.
Continuous Positive Airway Pressure Alert
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- While CPAP machines effectively deliver oxygen to sleep apnea sufferers, a common problem among these patients is that they tend to remove the face masks during their sleep, thus putting them at risk for impeding the flow oxygen and abnormal breathing.
- In the students’ initial research, they learned that 38,000 people in the United States die from sleep apnea annually due to improper use of the machine.
- The CPAP alert uses a differential temperature system attached to a CPAP machine: One thermister monitors body temperature, while another records the room temperature. If a patient removes the CPAP mask while sleeping, an alarm will sound due to a decrease in temperature from the mask thermister, which will have ceased recording body temperature.
- The CPAP alert was designed to help a team member’s father who was being treated for sleep apnea.
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