The technology adapts pressure delivery through the breathing cycle, which Noah said makes it more tolerable for users than traditional CPAP. The company’s soon-to-launch Kricket PAP device includes the KPAP algorithm but can also be used in traditional CPAP and automatic PAP therapy modes.

Noah said the sleep industry is currently at what he calls “an important inflection point,” with there being an increased focus on patient comfort and physiological alignment alongside efficacy. Noah and his team have spent the last two years working to perfect the machine’s Cloud technology so physicians and respiratory therapists can interact with the data and stay up to date on a patient’s status.

The KPAP is expected to be available on the market in August, when it will be first released in the company’s home state of Tennessee. But ResMed previewed the Kricket at the Medtrade Conference and Expo in March, where it earned a lot of buzz and a Providers Choice Bronze Award from the New Product Pavilion.

“The first three hours of Medtrade, we had more orders than we could almost make in the next six months,” Noah said. “So everything now [is focused on] the quality of the machines. It’s being sure that as you go from making 10,000 a month to 20,000 to 30,000 that the quality will be the same.”

Noah said there are approximately 250,000 new CPAPs dispensed every month in the United States—adding up to 3 million per year. While it will take time for KPAP to reach those numbers, he said the company is working to make sure everyone gets the same experience with their Kricket device.

“The whole question is, can you manufacture high volumes and maintain quality?” Noah said. “So, we’re not going to go super fast because that’s where you mess up. That’s what our competitors have done wrong. Our Cloud and the way it works and the way physicians and respiratory therapists will interact with it—that is so critical, and that’s what we spent so much time the last two years on, making sure that that’s just right because you’re asking people to switch from something they’re used to using every day, and people don’t like to switch.”

According to the National Institutes of Health, the average adherence rate for long-term CPAP use ranges between 30% to 60%, with the majority of people citing discomfort as a main reason for discontinuing their treatment.

“[KPAP] is not going to fix everything because a lot of adherence is behavioral,” Noah said. “It’s like people taking their medicine. You know, I mean, it’s embarrassing how poor compliance is. Just a simple medication, even [those] that don’t have side effects, people just … get tired of it. They quit. You know, it’s never going to be 100%, … but it’s clearly going to increase the number of people who can tolerate it.”

In addition to revamping therapeutic approaches, Noah said he also thinks there needs to be more thorough obstructive sleep apnea education for providers.

“Providers need more physiology and much more understanding of the engineering behind home testing devices and PAP devices,” he said. “These are tools, and we must be experts with these tools to best apply them to patients. In the U.S. likely 65% to 75% of patients are diagnosed and treated by a non-sleep physician or dentist with no formal training in sleep medicine. And then for patients that do get the right initial treatment, many are not getting proper follow-up. A provider has to be an expert on device event detection and its limitations to provide follow-up CPAP or KPAP care. I applaud those out there who do it well. We need more of them.”