Systems and methods for providing a user interface for a breathing assistance system are disclosed. A user interface may include a plurality of user-activated buttons configured to receive user input and a display communicatively coupled to the plurality of buttons. The display may include a plurality of function indicators, each function indicator associated with a corresponding one of the user-activated buttons and configured to display a different graphical function representations in different situations, the different graphical function representations indicating different functions of the corresponding user-activated button. The display may also include a modification indicator configured to display different graphical modification representations in different situations to indicate whether or not a selected parameter value may be modified using one or more of the user-activated buttons