[CPAP] Just Diagnosed - Hoping for Help

[Marillion]

To go into the clinical menu, hold down the rotary knob and the power button for a few seconds. Once you go into clinical menu you can go ahead and change the display settings from "essentials" to "plus." If you scroll down a bit, you will find it in there.

[Snoring Machine Momma]

I was able to follow that to a 't' - I will ck into tomorrow's readings!

Thx

[Snoring Machine Momma]

Wow... What great information! I have put together a collage of my readings I found most important...  I hope you guys can help me make sense of it. Last night, my AHI was the highest of the 3.83 days recorded. My diagnosed AHI was 7 - To me 3.83 seems a bit high with treatment.

- My husband complains regularly of my snoring.. How bad is it??? 

- Is there a way to do a new reading of my AHI with activated treatment?.. I wanted to see my results untreated.

- I am having a difficult time getting comfortable while sleeping with a device on my face. I am not claustrophobic - I just wake up sore around neck and shoulders from the way I laid on my pillow.. Do the CPAP pillows really make a difference? I see both good and bad reviews online.. Have you guys had any success with being comfortable - if so - please offer tips.. I think I am subconsciously aware of the device and trying not to squish it.

- I had a late night with my 10 mos old last night and innocently forgot to add more water to the machine.. It seems unharmed - will this ruin my APAP?

Link to Screenshot:
https://goo.gl/photos/bwWZb5TSZ8nMywdi8

[Marillion]

Thanks for the info. First of all, do not worry about squishing the Airfit P10. These masks are designed to be slept with/on and are designed to be very durable. You will not squish it or ruin it by sleeping with it on, you can rest assured on that.

Not adding water water will not ruin your machine. It would just likely discolor the bottom of your water reservoir. Personally, I turned down the humidity setting on my machine to a manual setting of 2 but left the heated hose temp on a medium to higher setting. It seems to give me enough humidity and I don't have to refill the reservoir so often. But we live in a relatively humid area so no issues with dry air here.

I would agree that you can do better than 3.83. To me, it looks like you are bumping into your max EPAP setting of 11 too often and your IPAP lower setting of 7 looks to be too low as your 95% range (where you are spending most of your time) is at 10.86. The machine is needing to make huge jumps from 7 to try to keep up with your Apneas but there are some occurring along the way.

Perhaps Sleeprider or someone more experienced can confirm but personally, I would say your minimum setting needs to go up by 1 to 8 for now and your maximum should go up to 13.

If you are being treated at effective pressures...I don't believe there should be any audible snoring occurring. Also, if your neck is getting sore, you may want to look at a better pillow. It might cut down on some of your obstructive apneas also. Some people on the forum here have reported great success with Buckweat pillows which can be purchased on Amazon or memory foam pillows. Those two options would help prevent your airway being closed due to your chin dropping down and closing off your airway. More pressure will not likely help in that sort of a scenario.

[Sleeprider]

SMM, you are currently using settings of 7-11 with no EPR and nearly all of your events are obstructive. The obstructive apnea are preceded by snores (can't see flow limits), and the pressure is reaching the maximum setting. Really the biggest mystery to me is how you had such a mild apnea result with no treatment. Anyway, your events are clustered into a fairly short time. You may need more pressure, or you may also benefit from some support of your airway through the use of a soft foam cervical collar, or specialized pillow that prevents your head from tilting toward your chest. I think you mentioned once that you use numerous pillows and you should know that elevating the head without support for the neck is a recipe for obstruction. In fact, if you were without your pillows for the sleep test this could explain the low result.

We can approach this by increasing pressure, which should reduce events, or looking a your sleep position and working with that. For pressure, a minimum of 8 and maximum of 12 would be the next step. How sensitive are you to pressure at this point?

[Marillion]

I should add that without EPR, I find it much less comfortable to sleep with my pressure setting. You may want to also adjust your EPR to a 1 to start with.

[Snoring Machine Momma]

The pressure does not seem to bother me most of the time.. There have been a couple of times that I felt suffocated and pulled it from my for air but that is simply me getting used to the experience I think...  Yes I typically have slept on 2 very flat pillows - I have for years made an 'L' shape and slept on the overlapped corner.. They are very flat.. but I might need to consider working with a new pillow set up..Also, I never was able to fall asleep in the sleep lab and later opted for an At Home Test - which is where the AHI 7 came from.. It was pulled from 3:50 of sleep before I pulled the tube out of my nose in my sleep. I tend to be a left side sleeper due to perpetual snoring.. I sleep away from my husband to try and minimize the noise.. We have been married 17 yrs and I have always snored but he said that the last cpl years have been the worst. 

I agree that untreated my AHI must be a bit too high for my treated readings to be so high.. That's why I wondered if I could give myself a new untreated reading with APAP machine with treatment turned off.

Also, Medigy is sps to be monitoring my results - Will they see these readings and make necessary adjustments - how does that work.. I figure everyone's needs changes from time to time anyway. Medigy said that my machine settings were remote access to them.

[Snoring Machine Momma]

I couldn't find the definition of EPR  - what is this?

[Marillion]

Most sleep labs don't bother changing anything. Though at your current AHI reading they would consider you "treated" and likely leave it at that.

[Snoring Machine Momma]

I also wanted to comment that when our newest family addition was a newborn, I wanted him to sleep in our bedroom! I often woke him up snoring... Of course this is before the machine.. But I was so exhausted that I am sure the snoring was extreme for having a newborn. My goal is to minimize my Apnea events and eliminate snoring for my husband. When I spoke with Medigy a few days ago.. They said that they will accept an AHI of 5 or less to be successful. I do not see how that is much better than the diagnosed 7 - plus my snoring is still occurring.

So should I make my own changes.. I think now that I have unlocked the information - It looked as if I could change the pressures.. What happens if I make my own changes.. Is Medigy going to complain and cause trouble.