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Overall quality of sleep
#1
Overall quality of sleep
Of the various metrics exposed by SleepyHead is there one that will give me an idea of the overall quality of sleep I experienced?

Attached is data from last night.

   

I slept a long time, but woke up groggy, depressed, & with a low-level headache. I remember dreaming. One was a bad dream. The other a very good one.

Thanks!
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#2
RE: Overall quality of sleep
Only you can judge the quality of your sleep. There are lots of things besides sleep apnea that can result in poor sleep. I often get poor sleep. Some days I can see why in SH, some days the data looks good. Tidal Volume is one that I look at. The more narrow the range, the better I generally slept. If it is a fat line or has lots of spikes above and below the median, then chances are I had a rougher night. But I had that last night and I feel good today, so go figure.
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#3
RE: Overall quality of sleep
A few questions. You are using a CPAP only machine, did insurance get that for you? Is it a rental? An auto machine would help.
Headaches are caused by CO2 not clearing out enough. Do you find that you have to push to exhale? Do you have the flex turned on? if not try it.
Your numbers are fine, so the apnea treatment is working. You now have to adjust what you can to make it more comfortable. If you are not comfortable you will not sleep well.
You still have a little snoring going on which would indicate an increase in pressure would help with that. For me I had to increase only 1.2CM to "fix" my issues. Might try a little increase and watch the data.
Move your humidity settings around, a little at a time and keep track of how you feel in the morning and how often you wake up.
I change my humidity settings depending on time of year, guessing that this is because of nighttime temperatures.

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#4
RE: Overall quality of sleep
It appears Cflex is turned on. So, CO2 retention shouldn't be an issue.
If I may suggest, instead of showing Snore, the Mask Pressure trace would be more useful.
By the numbers, things look OK. The flow pattern is a bit ragged.
IMNMO: the OP was titrated to "just good enough."

BTW -- why did you go off the machine from approx. 23:00 to 00:30 ?
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#5
RE: Overall quality of sleep
Thanks so much for your advice.

What do you mean by Mask Pressure trace? I see no graph in SleepyHead that's labeled Mask Pressure.

I couldn't get to sleep during the first session. Between 23:00 to 00:30 I got up, watched some TV or maybe worked at the computer until I got sleepy. I also listened to a sleep subliminal from YouTube. The number & duration of awake times during the night are sloooowwwwly diminishing. The most difficult thing is falling asleep.

By Flow Pattern you mean Flow Rate?

I have a DreamStation Pro. It has a Ramp setting that starts at a low pressure and gradually builds to the preset amount. In my case that's 12. Lately I've not used it because it seems that I have to work at breathing when I use it.

I live in a very humid environment here on the Texas Gulf Coast, but will test different humidity settings.

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#6
RE: Overall quality of sleep
To me your leak rate graph shows signs of either a very poor-fitting mask or mouth-leaking. Leaks like that will ruin a night's sleep, for sure. In addition to just bothering you to the point that they will wake you up, they also render the therapy useless because the CPAP machine can't maintain the pressure splint required to keep your airway from collapsing.

If a chin strap doesn't fix the mouth leaks, you'll need to switch to a full face mask.

Despite claims from manufacturers, there is no way to quantify the quality of sleep. There are a large number of factors that affect it, and like everything else of import not all of them can be measured.
Sleepster

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#7
RE: Overall quality of sleep
Additionally, notice that the "snores" tend to correlate with the leaks. They could be artifacts caused by the leaks.

-Ron
We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
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#8
RE: Overall quality of sleep
I feel your pain. I've been keeping a sleep journal for years. I rate my subjective quality of sleep each day on a scale from 1-5 with 1 being the worst and 5 the best. The rating describes how I feel in terms of energy, sleepiness, motivation and physical problems like headaches and muscle pain.

I can tell you that the SH metrics often look excellent and nearly identical for quality numbers of 1 and 5, so clearly the therapy is working. There's another factor that's not revealed by the SH numbers. If I ever find it, you'll see me dancing in the street.

I'm always skeptical of very low AHI. I usually find long periods of no events at all, and that means I wasn't sleeping. On the other hand, if I see a baseline of low AHI and a few higher bumps while I sleep for 5+ hours without a break with few snore events, I often feel pretty good.
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#9
RE: Overall quality of sleep
Just thinking about CO2 retention because that is why my Doctor moved me to BiLevel, of course I also have mild COPD which would effect that. I said headaches and Doctor just said "that's the CO2".

Any reason you might suspect COPD on top of SA like I have? Smoking, dust, fire fighter, woodworker?
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#10
RE: Overall quality of sleep
(07-31-2016, 11:33 PM)Jim Bronson Wrote: I can tell you that the SH metrics often look excellent and nearly identical for quality numbers of 1 and 5, so clearly the therapy is working. There's another factor that's not revealed by the SH numbers. If I ever find it, you'll see me dancing in the street.

I will be right behind you! These machine collect a lot of data, but they don't record everything that might affect your quality of sleep. I had a bad night last night according to SH, but I feel great today! There is so much to learn here.
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