Background: I'm a 38yo male, 6ft-1in, 200lbs. I have struggled with sleep for a long time. In 2016 I had a polysomnagram which showed roughly an AHI of 6 per hour supine and 10 per hour in REM, thus I was diagnosed with mild obstructive sleep apnea. I was encouraged to try CPAP but at the time preferred to try lifestyle changes (which I didn't do). Since then, sleep/snoring has gotten much worse. I engaged with a new sleep doctor, they did a home sleep study which came back negative (<5) but were open to a CPAP trial since I was already pre-approved by insurance. I am also working with an ENT to evaluate impact of slight deviated septum (small impact it appears), get a full allergy test (waiting), and a CT of nasal structures (waiting). I wear a night guard for grinding so I don't think an oral appliance is an option on top of that.
I currently have a 1-month trial rental of an ResMed AirSense 10. I want to make the most of this trial and be as scientific about it as possible. I immediately loaded the data from each night into OSCAR. After two nights I have a lot of questions.
First night: Pressure was set at clinic for 5-15. I barely slept at all, it was just such a strange sensation. I would estimate that out of the ~8 hours, I was asleep for maybe 3, so I don't know if this data is worth anything. I constantly felt like I wasn't getting enough oxygen and really struggled to tolerate everything, but I pushed through it. I also felt like the air was uncomfortably warm.
Second night: I increased the min pressure to 6.6 (arbitrary), turned off hose heating, turned off the ramp settings. Overall I tolerated everything a lot better, got to sleep more comfortably (also because I only slept 3 hr the previous night). I made it about 4.5 hours and then took the mask off as I felt a little claustrophic, but don't totally remember as I was pretty out of it. Slept okay the rest of the night.
Here are my questions:
1. I was surprised to see a HUGE number of Clear Airway events. Both nights, there was only 1 obstructive event and ~5 hypopnea events, but 154 and 75 clear airway events (respectively). My overnight polysomnogram three years ago did not note anything about central sleep apnea. Is this related to starting CPAP or should I be concerned? I thought maybe it was just a fluke the first night since I was basically awake all night, but then it repeated again.
2. I realized I often stop breathing as I am laying in bed trying to fall asleep. Like I'll realize I am unconsciously holding my breath. Is this indicative of central sleep apnea? I hadn't thought to bring this up with my sleep doctor yet.
3. Can anyone review my OSCAR plots and provide general feedback? Is there anything else obvious that you see? What parameters should I focus on experimenting with?
Thank you in advance.