Pulse Oximetry Reading Help wanted!

[2Tim215]

Can anyone tell me where I can find information on reading the waves of the SPO2? I would like to be able to know how to read my graphs past, present, and future. Appreciate any information, links, etc. Thank you!

[PaulaO2]

The waves are like any other graph.

The green at the top is your oxygen levels. The blue is the heart rate. The red line is the 88% blood O2 danger zone. Not sure why they picked 88%. What you are looking for are any dips in the red line. You will probably see the blue line get higher whenever the green line dips.

You can click the buttons labeled 1, 10, and 60 for the 'spread' of what you see on the screen (the numbers are minutes). Clicking the > moves you forward 5 minutes, the >> moves you an hour.

Is that what you meant? Or do you need more?

Other explanations are here:
http://www.apneaboard.com/wiki/index.php...2_software

[2Tim215]

The waves are like any other graph.

The green at the top is your oxygen levels. The blue is the heart rate. The red line is the 88% blood O2 danger zone. Not sure why they picked 88%. What you are looking for are any dips in the red line. You will probably see the blue line get higher whenever the green line dips.

You can click the buttons labeled 1, 10, and 60 for the 'spread' of what you see on the screen (the numbers are minutes). Clicking the > moves you forward 5 minutes, the >> moves you an hour.

Is that what you meant? Or do you need more?

Other explanations are here:
http://www.apneaboard.com/wiki/index.php...2_software

I'll check the link you shared. For some reason my red line was set at 90 in the software. I can probably figure out how to lower it to the 88. Actually I was wondering about the waves in SPO2, what they mean, why different durations, etc.

[PaulaO2]

Ah. The red line limit I think is changeable. Click the little wrench/screwdriver icon on the bottom left.

For one, you've got yours down to mere seconds. Which is okay I guess but too finite for this type of stuff.

That big dip in the red line is where your blood O2 dropped for about 10 seconds. It rose after that so I would assume your CPAP is working!

I usually just glanced at the data, looking for anything WAY down or different. Like you, I have a dumb machine so the oximeter is my only way of telling if the treatment is working. I use the device if I have a change in meds or am sick or feel like I am not getting adequate sleep. After glancing through it, I then hit the print button, select either the summary or oximetry button then the preview button. This gives the data in numerical form vs pretty graph. It was the summary that I printed out each day then, starting day 5 or so, that's when I start to really pay attention to see if there are trends.

[b360155]

You can also click on the "M" button on the bottom and click the all data check box if you want to see the graphs for the entire night. One thing I've noticed on mine is that occasionally I'll see a significant, sudden and short term drop in my O2 level. When I zoom in a little tighter though, I'll see the line is broken just before the drop instead of a continuous one. I interpret those to mean that I probably moved in my sleep and knocked the unit loose for a second and got a faulty reading.

[PaulaO2]

Yeah. What I look for is if the pulse also dropped. If both dropped, then it came loose.

[2Tim215]

You can also click on the "M" button on the bottom and click the all data check box if you want to see the graphs for the entire night. One thing I've noticed on mine is that occasionally I'll see a significant, sudden and short term drop in my O2 level. When I zoom in a little tighter though, I'll see the line is broken just before the drop instead of a continuous one. I interpret those to mean that I probably moved in my sleep and knocked the unit loose for a second and got a faulty reading.

Thank you, I didn't know what the M was for, I've been reading so much trying to absorb as much as I can I probably missed it if it came with the manual. I did notice and was told when there are grey lines that was a break in data and what immediately follows is the bounce back to normal recording. My unit did fall off twice one night, and sure enough, there were the grey lines. Last night I did a test, no sleep medicine, .4 raise in pressure and was surprised at the findings. My low heart rate was brought up from past tests at 54-55 to 60-64, my O2 still all over the place but had more hits in the 98-99 range and higher O2 levels than my 23 month old Sleep Study on CPAP 7cm and my recent testing at prescribed 7cm. For the life of me I cannot imagine why they didn't increase the pressure to 8cm??? My AHI was 69.3 with Severe OSA. My O2's were 91-98 mostly low 90's! Looking at the original Sleep Study Graph there was plenty of room for improvement. Although the Doctor stated in results highest O2 was 98, it was only and possibly one spike one time but looks more like a 96 at the most to me, not to nit pick but I guess further testing is needed on my part to see if stats stay the same with last nights test.
I can't help to wonder if the Doctor feel asleep during my study

[b360155]

2Tim215:

Welcome to the Forum and it sounds like you're on your way to successful CPAP treatment!

One really nice thing about the Contec pulse oximeters is that you can import your data and sync it with your graphs using the Sleepyhead software that is available for free on the internet. Combined, these graphs can be very informative and helpful.

Here's an example of my CMS-50D Plus graphs for the evening of 10/24:

Please note that the 3 largest downward spikes in the SpO2 levels on the graph resulted from my moving in my sleep and knocking the unit loose. If I zoom in on the graphs, I indeed see gray lines preceeding each of these downward spikes.

And here's an example of that data that I've imported into the Sleepyhead software and synced with my other CPAP graphs:

Please note that more graphs (usage, snore, flow limitation and several others) are included in the software but this is all I could fit in one screenshot.

This was obviously an excellent evening for me with only 1 obstructive apnea event and virtually no mask leaks. In my sleep study in September of 2011, I had an AHI of 16.3/hour of total sleep and REM AHI of 43.1. During the study, I had 78 desaturations with a minimum SpO2 of 71%.

I was prescribed a pressure setting of 10.0 and over the past year, I've done some tweaking here and there with both specific CPAP settings and APAP ranges. What I've found is that a straight CPAP pressure setting of 11.4 works best for me. When I have tweaked my settings, I've always done it in relatively small increments and then watch my results for a month at a time before making any further adjustments.

Good luck with your therapy and if you have any questions, let me know and I'll try to help with getting answers if I can. And if I can't there's others on this forum that probably can.

[2Tim215]

Thanks B36, I don't believe the Sleepy Head software can help me right now as I am stuck with the ResMed Escape but working hard on getting the AutoSet! I do have a question about the CMS 50D+. I can't find where to set the time, so every time I upload a report I get the 00:00 for time.
My O2's are all over but this is actually the first time I have several hits to the high 90's which made me feel good, but also hit into the 80's and "zoomed" in with the 1 minute option and see no data breaks like in the past.
Here is my full graph,

and here is the Ten,

[b360155]

Yep, you're out of luck if you have the Escape, unfortunately...good luck on getting an S9 Autoset! One thing I notice is that it looks like I'm behind the times on my software V098.1 and that I need to upgrade to V1.2. Looks like they added bars at the top and bottom of the graphs to indicate events which is a nice addition. As far as the clock time, unless they've changed something in V1.2, when you're viewing the SpO2 review software, it doesn't show clock time it just shows running time starting at 00:00. It isn't until you import the data into Sleepyhead that you can reset the time on your pulse ox graphs so that it's in clock time. If you look at my two graphs, you'll see that the SpO2 Review graphs start at 0, same as yours. But when I import into the Sleepyhead software, I am able to reset it at that point so that it matches the clock time period of those graphs.