A first BLUETOOTH device includes a transceiver configured to receive a control procedure packet from a second BLUETOOTH device during a BLUETOOTH connection event of a BLUETOOTH connection between the first BLUETOOTH device and the second BLUETOOTH device. The first BLUETOOTH device also includes a controller coupled to the transceiver and configured to set a more data (MD) bit of a response packet to the control procedure packet to a first value independent of whether the first BLUETOOTH device has more data to send to the second BLUETOOTH device. The first value corresponds to maintaining the BLUETOOTH connection event open. The transceiver is further configured to send the response packet to the second BLUETOOTH device during the BLUETOOTH connection event.