The History of Alliance of Sleep Apnea Partners:

The Alliance of Sleep Apnea Partners (ASAP) is a patient-oriented non-profit organization
established in 2018. We are committed to promoting diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of
sleep apnea on behalf of the patient community to advance the state of patient care and life-long
well-being of sleep apnea patients.
 

In 2014, ASAP founders came together to become the Patient Engagement Panel of
MyApnea.org. This panel participated in their bi-monthly meetings at MyApnea.org, monitored
the community forum, served on special committees, participated in PCORI grant opportunities
and wrote blogs. They even authored a paper with MyApnea.org steering committee members
titled Patient Partnerships Transforming Sleep Medicine Research and Clinical Care:
Perspectives from the Sleep Apnea Patient-Centered Outcomes Network. The engagement panel
further hosted an event at the AASM learning lounge at the SLEEP 2017 meeting on the topic of
Patients as Partners in Advancing Sleep Health Engagement Strategies, Challenges and
Opportunities.

In 2018, the members of the patient engagement panel established ASAP as a 501c3
organization. They identified the need for broader patient and community engagement as well
engagement with a boarder group of stakeholders outside of the sleep community to address
concerns of sleep apnea patients with the goal of advancing their well-being. They helped draft
the Women and Sleep apnea toolkit in collaboration with the Society for Women’s Health
Research (SWHR) in 2016. They continued to share their voices at SLEEP 2018 by participating
in a panel discussion on New Paradigms in Sleep Apnea Management: Incorporating the Patient
Voice in Personalizing Treatment. That same year, ASAP founders joined the American
Thoracic Society (AHS) Public Advisory Roundtable (PAC) and have continued to engage and
lend their voices there.

In 2020, ASAP was also invited to join the Patient Advocacy Roundtable hosted by the
American Association Sleep Medicine (AASM) and participated in the patient advocacy
roundtable panel discussion at the SLEEP 2022. To this day ASAP continues to engage with our
sister organization MyApnea.org on regular basis. As an alliance, we are focused on growing our
partnerships and collaborations with organizations that are focused on sleep disorders as well as
organizations focused on diseases and conditions that are co-morbid with sleep apnea.