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William's Therapy Thread
#1
William's Therapy Thread
I'm not sure where I should begin or even how much detail to offer, so I guess I'll start with the obvious. I'm William, am completely new to PAP therapy and I am definitely not having a good time with it so far. Feel free to call me William, as the screen name is nothing more than a very bad pun.

I've been sleeping poorly for many years now. I have been told I snore very loudly. I grind my teeth when I sleep. I am a very active sleeper most nights. (My bedding ought to demand hazard pay!)

I finally decided to try and do something about it after switching to a new doctor. This culminated in an at-home sleep study with a Philips Alice NightOne device. This went extremely poorly for multiple reasons. I typically sleep minimally clothed and the instructions indicated that wearing a shirt was required. Between the tension of the band that ran around my chest and the constant reappearance of brilliant yellow fault indicator lamps, and the cannula...I didn't sleep at all. They wanted a minimum of six hours of data. I gave up after four. Unsurprisingly, the results came back as inconclusive.

The hospital staff suggested I should have an on-site sleep study and I declined. I don't sleep well anywhere that isn't my own bed, and the representative I spoke with openly admitted she had tried and failed to complete the on-site study. She said noises from the rest of the hospital were clearly audible and after an hour, told them she was done and going home. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have made it either. (She also said that she'd tried the at-home test with the Alice device three times and didn't last as long as I did...)

A few more months went by. Not happy with the new doctor, I went back to my longtime doctor and finally shared my concerns with him. Another sleep study was ordered, this time using a WatchPat One device at home. I've attached the results to this post. (I track my sleep with an app known as Autosleep on an Apple Watch, and was going to include a screenshot of that if anyone was interested, but I see there is a three attachment limit. If anyone's interested, I will include that in some other way.)

The diagnosis given was "mild obstructive sleep apnea", with a prescription for an APAP machine, pressure range of 5-20 cm wc and recommendations to do things like lose weight, have a regular bed time, practice good sleep hygiene and so on. (I am working on the weight aspect with decent success. I have a long way to go.)

At the hospital's suggestion, I went with Apria Healthcare as the DME provider. They sent a ResMed Airsense 11 Autoset machine, unheated hose, Airfit N20 nasal mask, and nothing beyond some printed material for guidance in getting started. (Also sent was a chin strap whose purpose I had no idea of, until I searched the web. That's how I found this forum. I've been reading a lot, and trying to take it all in.)

I spent several hours while awake, wearing the mask with the machine running to get a feel for it as the DME and ResMed recommend. Then I decided I was ready to try it while sleeping. That was a disaster. I never made it to sleep, confirmed that I breathe through my mouth at times, and when I rolled over in bed, I pulled the machine over and dumped the humidifier into the tube. I called Apria the next day and inquired as to what I'd need to do in order to return everything and forget this.

I then reconsidered, thinking maybe I'd been a bit hasty. I have since had an appointment with Apria Healthcare in person, where I switched to the ResMed Airfit F30i mask. I have been much happier with that, although leakage around the contour of my nose and lower lip have been a problem at higher pressures. They also yelled at me about putting an SD card in the machine, telling me that using any old card would mess it up, clicking my card out and jamming the new one in -- while the machine was powered up! Their representative was bossy and unhelpful, also telling me that they didn't have longer hoses any more and I'd again mess the machine up if I used one. (I didn't say a word about knowing how to access the clinician's settings. I figure their representative would have entered lower Earth orbit if I had.)

Call me crazy, but I don't like the presence of the cellular modem. I watched a video where someone took the Airsense 11 apart and the modem is integrated into the main board. It's under a metal shield, so I don't know if it's socketed. Assuming I keep up with this, I would want to disable the modem after the machine is under my ownership. I am not sure that's possible without endangering the machine's life. Apria, for their part, said I was the only person who had ever expressed concern about it. 

I was hoping that when I made my first posting here, I'd have collected some data, explored it with the OSCAR software and shared it for guidance and recommendation. The trouble is, using the machine has been an awful experience. As much as I had hoped I could cope with this, as many of my friends have said "it's great -- you'll never want to be without it" ... I haven't managed to get to sleep with it on and I don't think I can, in spite of how badly I wanted this to help. I've even tried sleep aids in the hopes that a little 'push' would help -- and they didn't even faze me.

There are the biggest problems I'm having:

1. Once the pressure gets up to 10 cm wc or so, the machine is very loud when I inhale. The sound is definitely coming from the machine's air inlet grille. It's not unlike the sound an operating carburetor makes as air rushes in. (A friend of mine has an Airsense 10 machine and demonstrated it for me last night. It's silent. The Airsense 11 Autoset I have is not.) I'm a light sleeper and there is no way I can get to sleep with that kind of noise going on.

2. Pressures much past that 10 cm wc figure start to make me feel like the machine is pushing me WAY too hard. After a while, for want of a better way to put it, I feel as though I'm being inflated. This was much worse with the nasal mask.

3. Every couple of seconds, I have a need to swallow saliva. I've done this my whole life and never thought a thing of it. I don't know if it is normal or not. Apparently I do this as I exhale, and it's messing with the machine to say the least. When I try to finish exhaling, the machine is fighting me. The F30i mask substantially improved this, but it's still a very weird feeling.

4. I can "overbreathe" the machine at the low end of the pressure ramp, and that's just my normal breathing. I'm not trying to make it happen. When I do this, it makes the air inlet valves on the mask open in response and the result feels quite strange as the pressure drops momentarily. I tried to turn the ramp setting off to see if that would help and was not at all happy with the results. The machine shot up to somewhere around 16 cm wc pressure and that hurt. The mask also leaked a lot and I could not get it to stop.

5. I can force air through my tear ducts if I close my nose and exhale. I'd forgotten all about this until it happened with the machine on! (Here again, the rep at Apria Healthcare was not at all helpful and just insisted it was a mask leak, until I showed her.) This was a huge problem with the nasal mask.

I have spoken with the pulmonary doctor's office and they want to see the data from a month's use of the machine before I meet with them. I really think I need to see them sooner than that about some of these concerns, and will try to do so, although they balked when I insisted.

I could definitely use and would be greatly appreciative of any thoughts, help, encouragement, even condolences. I haven't really had any great guidance from anywhere else, despite asking for such. It has very much been a "here's your CPAP machine, good luck!" kind of experience so far. Seeing all the other success stories here and elsewhere has been a little disheartening in a way. Maybe this isn't for me?  Sad


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#2
RE: William's Therapy Thread
Nobody? Well, OK...  Huh

I know I wrote a small book about my entrance into the land of CPAP therapy. Brevity's never been my strong suit. Maybe that scared everyone off or I was asking too much of their time? Maybe my post just got lost in the shuffle? By the time I'd thought about what I'd do to substantially shorten it, editing the post was no longer an option.

I am beyond tired of being jerked around by my DME provider. Every concern I've had is just a point of argument for them. I don't believe the machine I received is working properly. In particular, I can't believe how loud it is once the pressure's gotten up to 10 cm water column or so. Even if it is working correctly, I am such a light sleeper and the noise (from the machine, not a mask leak or anything else) made on inhalation is simply intolerable. I'm not so sure the therapy isn't equally so. I'm taking the machine back to them at the end of the week and maybe I'll go with another DME provider. I don't know. I'll continue losing weight and who is to say that might not work every bit as well as PAP would have, had I been able to stand it.

Thank you all for your time. (No sarcasm. I'm very sincere.)

To the administration and moderation staff of this board: Please delete my account and postings. (If I can close my account by myself or delete my own posts/attachments, please direct me as to how I should do so.) If that's not permissible, I would at least like to have the sleep study attachments removed from my initial post.

Sleep-well
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#3
RE: William's Therapy Thread
You give up to easily.  Bigwink 

Sometimes a thread gets "lost" amongst others, so I always advise that if someone hasn't yet responded to your initial post, feel free to "bump" the post back up to the top of the forum by simply making a small request like "Can someone help?" or by posting simply "BUMP" as a new reply in your thread.

So, my post here will "bump" your thread back up to the top, and I'm hoping some of our experienced members can offer some insight to at least some of the issues you're facing.  I wish I had the knowledge to solve all of your problems, but I know we have numerous members here more experienced than myself who can help.

Thanks for joining the forum - if you stay tuned, I'm sure that others can help.  Just be patient, and be willing to "bump" your post again if no one responds in a timely manner.  But keep in mind, sometimes folks are busy and don't have the time to help with a long, detailed reply, but they might come back later to answer your questions.  Sometimes it takes a day or more.

Regarding the deletion of accounts and posts, you can read our policy on that here:
http://www.apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-...n-Requests

But please - folks here love to help others.  Just give 'em a chance to do that, and remember that sometimes, 'ya gotta stick your hand up and wave at us several times to get our attention (in other words, be willing to bump your post back up to the top of the forum).   Remember, a lot of us are old folks who don't always catch it when a post goes unanswered.    Too-funny
SuperSleeper
Apnea Board Administrator
www.ApneaBoard.com


INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.


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#4
RE: William's Therapy Thread
William, also please expect that in order to help you, some may ask for more details or specific questions in order to pinpoint the primary source of the problem.  So also be willing to have a bit of "question and answer" back-and-forth stuff.  These are likely problems that aren't going to be solved via one or two posts. 

Coffee
SuperSleeper
Apnea Board Administrator
www.ApneaBoard.com


INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.


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#5
RE: William's Therapy Thread
Thank you for getting back to me. In other forums where I've participated both past and present, they've frowned on people making lots of "bump" posts. I wouldn't want to bother or annoy anyone, nor waste bandwidth and storage doing so.

I did look around to see if there was a policy on account/post deletion (along with a way to do so myself) and didn't come across that post. I too very much hate to ever see useful information disappear, yet I am also a big believer in a person's "right to disappear". I can't say as I was concerned about privacy or anything like that. The request to delete the sleep study attachments was just to free up space for someone else. I was feeling very discouraged about every aspect of this, and figured I would just move on, regroup and possibly do something else. After all, nothing I posted here was any kind of great resource.

I'm happy to answer just about any question anyone would have about anything I've posted.

Although I have sent both the machine and DME away, I'm still going to meet with my pulmonologist and bring my concerns to them. I don't know if I want to try again or not. In spite of all the possible benefits, I have serious doubts about developing tolerance.
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#6
RE: William's Therapy Thread
William,
Sorry your post has gone unanswered.

The WatchPat Study show a diagnosis of Mild Sleep Apnea with an AHI of 5.0.
Was there a recommendation on the study?  What was on the 4th page?

Apria doesn't have the greatest reputation.  Don't be fazed by their threats and scare tactics.  With that said, your Pap machine should be under warranty.  If you can't sleep with the noise, return it and ask for a replacement.  If the DME gives you grief, find another DME.  

Now if you do decide to continue with Cpap therapy, we need to see some data, which means you are going to have to give this a serious attempt to wear the mask and get some sleep.  When you switched from the nasal mask to the full face mask, did you change the mask setting on your machine?

The settings of 5 - 20 are not the greatest to start out with.  Even without seeing your data, I'm going to suggest you set the minimum to 7cm and maximum at 15cm.
Set EPR to 3.  These are standard settings to start with.  If you can get in a couple nights on the machine, even if it's only 2-3 hrs, we may be able to advise further.

You will need a SD card in the Cpap while you are sleeping.

Be sure to read over the Mask Primer.  This may help you get a better mask fit.

http://www.apneaboard.com/wiki/index.php...ask_Primer

It's totally up to you if you want to continue, but know that even mild apnea causes sleep disruptions and over time, untreated apnea will aggravate other health issues.
OpalRose
Apnea Board Administrator
www.apneaboard.com

_______________________
OSCAR Chart Organization
How to Attach Images and Files.
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INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE.  ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA.  INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
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#7
RE: William's Therapy Thread
About all I can offer is commiseration.

I, too, am a gulper.  I swallow incessantly, and that means I belch all day long.  At night, too, when I turn onto my left side (which you might already know is the 'recovery' side after anesthesia and colonoscopy because they blow you up down there and then wait for you to wake up and to fart for about a full hour afterwards).  On my left side, my atrial fibrillation is a bit more likely to kick in, but it's also the best way to eructate if you are aerophagic (eat air).

You should probably see an ENT, and make it a good one. 

Your 5 cm H2O is probably too low, probably by about 2 cm.  You can change it yourself.  Once we see your OSCAR results, you might realize that your high setting is too high, but for right now we should let the machine decide.

It sounds like you're simply going to have to get to know your setup more intimately.  Sleep with it more, maybe even wear it during the day.  If you nap, definitely wear it...!!!!  But it will eventually become less intrusive, which I think is what you're telling yourself it is.

Treat this like you have a new diagnosis of cancer.  If it were true, how assiduous would you become about getting rid of it?  Ditto for your nocturnal breathing problems.
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#8
RE: William's Therapy Thread
Snorelacks, I usually look for the posts without useful replies and I'm sorry I missed yours.  You presented a lot of issues in your first post here, and my first reply to that is, DME's mostly all suck and are worthless.  Let me try to narrow it down from there. I share your aversion to clinical sleep studies. I had my first and only one in April 2008, and have worked very hard to avoid another one.  It's not easy because the DMEs want authorization handed to them on a silver platter, so I'm still fighting for a replacement machine, 5-years into Medicare, but at least I got my supplies reinstated.

Quote:1. Once the pressure gets up to 10 cm wc or so, the machine is very loud when I inhale. The sound is definitely coming from the machine's air inlet grille. It's not unlike the sound an operating carburetor makes as air rushes in. (A friend of mine has an Airsense 10 machine and demonstrated it for me last night. It's silent. The Airsense 11 Autoset I have is not.) I'm a light sleeper and there is no way I can get to sleep with that kind of noise going on.

Posting a daily details chart in Oscar would be useful so we can see your machine type and settings (your profile is no help), and I assume from this you have an Airsense 11.  I have no personal experience with the 11 series Resmed machines, and use a 10-series.  If the sound is from a rush of air at the machine, then it might be useful to put the device into a bedside drawer with the tube and power coming from a hole in the back.  I do that with my machine and it is silent, even though it has 23,000 hours on it. If the noise is mechanical, the fan unit may be bad.  There were a lot of bad fan motors in the 10-series, and they were covered under warranty or the motor could be replaced with parts available online.

Quote:2. Pressures much past that 10 cm wc figure start to make me feel like the machine is pushing me WAY too hard. After a while, for want of a better way to put it, I feel as though I'm being inflated. This was much worse with the nasal mask.

Your machine has exhale pressure relief (EPR), and without a chart or settings, there is no way to know if you're using it. Please post a chart.

Quote:3. Every couple of seconds, I have a need to swallow saliva. I've done this my whole life and never thought a thing of it. I don't know if it is normal or not. Apparently I do this as I exhale, and it's messing with the machine to say the least. When I try to finish exhaling, the machine is fighting me. The F30i mask substantially improved this, but it's still a very weird feeling.

Now we know you're using the F30i mask. Again, EPR might be useful to mitigate this problem.

Quote:4. I can "overbreathe" the machine at the low end of the pressure ramp, and that's just my normal breathing. I'm not trying to make it happen. When I do this, it makes the air inlet valves on the mask open in response and the result feels quite strange as the pressure drops momentarily. I tried to turn the ramp setting off to see if that would help and was not at all happy with the results. The machine shot up to somewhere around 16 cm wc pressure and that hurt. The mask also leaked a lot and I could not get it to stop.

It sounds like you're actually opening the anit-asphixiation valve in the mask.  Show me the chart, and we will either increase ramp pressure or time to prevent this.

OSCAR is free, and instructions for orgainzing charts and posting images as an attachment are links in my signature. If you are unable to to do that, let me know the full set of settings on your machine including EPR, ramp starting pressure and time. Your issues are all able to be addressed through settings.  Let's work on this, and maybe we can get things solved, even if it's only one problem at a time.
Sleeprider
Apnea Board Moderator
www.ApneaBoard.com

____________________________________________
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INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
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#9
RE: William's Therapy Thread
I know it is recommended not to use the reply with quote options. I am only doing so in the hopes that it will be clearer who I am replying to. If I should not do so even then, I will stop immediately.

(03-04-2023, 06:58 PM)OpalRose Wrote: The WatchPat Study show a diagnosis of Mild Sleep Apnea with an AHI of 5.0.
Was there a recommendation on the study?  What was on the 4th page?

If the DME gives you grief, find another DME.  

When you switched from the nasal mask to the full face mask, did you change the mask setting on your machine?

The settings of 5 - 20 are not the greatest to start out with.  Even without seeing your data, I'm going to suggest you set the minimum to 7cm and maximum at 15cm. Set EPR to 3.

You will need a SD card in the Cpap while you are sleeping.

Be sure to read over the Mask Primer.  This may help you get a better mask fit.

It was the first page of the report that contained recommendations from the doctor who studied the data. Unsure of whether or not I could do a suitable job of redacting personal information on that page, I left it out but included the recommendations made in my initial post. They were to use a CPAP machine (set at 5-20 cm water), lose weight, have a regular bed time and practice sleep hygiene. Except for that first page, I posted everything they gave me a copy of. If there's more, I don't know it. I can certainly ask for it when I meet the pulmonologist. If there is something else I should ask for, I will try to get that as well.

I may well look for another DME, if I decide to continue.

Yes, the mask setting was changed (by Apria Healthcare). Although I found out how, I did not dare to change machine settings owing to the very negative reaction of Apria staff when they found I had installed an SD card into the machine. I now know for a fact they could have seen any change I made.

I had an SD card in the machine but never managed to actually sleep with it on, despite several attempts. It made too much noise for me to sleep, and not even sleep aids helped me. Thus, at least for now, I have no data to offer.

I have spent a lot of time reading the articles on the wiki here, and so, so many posts...the F30i mask I have now was just about perfect and if I continue, I would certainly use it again.

(03-04-2023, 06:59 PM)mesenteria Wrote: About all I can offer is commiseration.

I, too, am a gulper.  I swallow incessantly, and that means I belch all day long.

Your 5 cm H2O is probably too low, probably by about 2 cm.  You can change it yourself.  Once we see your OSCAR results, you might realize that your high setting is too high, but for right now we should let the machine decide.

Sleep with it more, maybe even wear it during the day.  If you nap, definitely wear it...!!!! 

Treat this like you have a new diagnosis of cancer.  If it were true, how assiduous would you become about getting rid of it?  Ditto for your nocturnal breathing problems.

Commiseration works. Smile

I don't know if I'd describe myself as a "gulper". Throughout the day, I'm not swallowing air and I don't have trouble with belching. What I do have is a need to swallow saliva that builds up every few seconds. It's been that way my whole life (40 years so far) and never bothered me. It's just something I do. But it did cause a "conflict" with the machine. If doing that means something is "wrong" with me, I never knew it and haven't been worse off for it that I know of.

See above for the rationale about not changing the pressures myself. I know I could have and learned about how to do it here. I feared the wrath of Apria after my experience with the SD card. if I do this again, I'm going to own the machine outright and the internal modem will be disabled permanently.

I did wear the mask with the machine running for a few hours a day. It really didn't seem to get any easier. The biggest problem when I tried to wear it to bed was one of noise. (There was also the one time I ran out of tube and yanked the machine right over, dumping the humidifier and cutting off my air supply. That was exciting.)

I'm not trying to be contrary when I say that I'd find cancer a fair bit more serious than a diagnosis of mild sleep apnea. Of course, if I had cancer, I'd fight like hell to get past it. I had a lot of positive reinforcement when I started this journey. I first thought I would do almost anything to sleep better. What I don't think I can stand to do is make my sleep a whole lot worse before it gets better. Not finding myself getting used to the machine when everyone I know who uses one says it's great made me feel bad to say the least.

Having parted ways with the DME provider, I don't have the machine any longer. I do have the masks. They didn't want those back anyway. If I go around again with a different DME, I'll reuse at the F30i mask at least.

(03-04-2023, 07:06 PM)Sleeprider Wrote: DME's mostly all suck and are worthless.

Posting a daily details chart in Oscar would be useful so we can see your machine type and settings (your profile is no help), and I assume from this you have an Airsense 11.

If the sound is from a rush of air at the machine, then it might be useful to put the device into a bedside drawer with the tube and power coming from a hole in the back.

Your machine has exhale pressure relief (EPR), and without a chart or settings, there is no way to know if you're using it. Please post a chart.

It sounds like you're actually opening the anit-asphixiation valve in the mask.

Hmm, that's not much of a reassuring thought, in regard to the DMEs.  Grin

What's in my profile (unless there's another one somewhere I don't know about) is as accurate as I can make it, and does reflect the way things are as of right now. Everything about the past is still in my first post as written, including the type of machine supplied. The machine provided by the DME was an Airsense 11 Autoset model. I don't have it any longer. I parted ways with it and them after repeated bad interactions. It came to me with the EPR setting on and at level three. When I first visited their office to voice some concerns and try a different mask, they reset the EPR value to one. Pressure was set to range between 5-20 cm water, which I have gathered from a lot of reading here is a common but ridiculous setting and (does?) negate any value the EPR setting has. The machine was set to operate in APAP mode. When the ramp started, it was at 4 cm water.

I had hoped my first post would be able to contain information from OSCAR, but I never managed to sleep with the machine, so I don't have any to offer. And now, of course, I don't have that or any other machine any longer. I did spend many hours wearing it while awake, so as to try and become accustomed to it. I tried to sleep with it on several times and never got to a point where I could do so. After lying there wide awake and miserable for 35-40 minutes, I'd stop.

At present I don't have any bedside drawers I can use. I did try the machine in a few different positions to see if I could find a way to cut down on the noise. My bed sits flat on the floor, so I couldn't put it under there to try and reduce the noise. A friend of mine has the Airsense 10 Autoset machine and she demonstrated it for me one evening. It's sitting right there on her nightstand and was utterly silent in operation. The Airsense 11 Autoset I had never was anything like that quiet. My complaints to Apria about the noise were continually rebuffed.

Yes, at the lower pressure levels of the ramp, I was opening the valves in the mask. That didn't stop until it got up to maybe 7 cm water or so. (I'm not exactly sure of the pressure value where it stopped happening.)
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#10
RE: William's Therapy Thread
William, then at this point, I think to even proceed much further, you're going to have to obtain a CPAP machine (preferably a data-recording auto-CPAP) in order for anyone here to help you with acclimating to your therapy and fine-tuning your settings so that you're able to sleep in relative peace with the machine.

Most of the advice offered around here is via the analysis of some basic sleep data using OSCAR.  To see a list of machines that OSCAR supports, go HERE.  Short of obtaining another CPAP machine, it's going to be difficult for anyone to help with anything other than them offering that "commiseration" you spoke about.   Cool

In the end, you're going to have to decide for yourself whether or not you want to seriously pursue CPAP.  I'll offer some advice, and it's only my  own personal experience - but when I was diagnosed with sleep apnea, I decided right then and there that I would make CPAP work for me.  It's all in the attitude.  I had to mentally learn to "love" the machine, for it was helping me avoid all sorts of potential health issues.  It's your friend.  It's not an obnoxious, noisy and irritating torture device, even though some folks start off their therapy thinking that way.   Too-funny 

This is a battle for your mind, really.  You have to tell yourself that you're going to figure this stuff out and make it work. And then the folks here can help you, once you've convinced yourself that sleep apnea is serious, and treatment failure is not an option.  It may not seem as "serious" as cancer, but in many ways it is, given the fact that untreated sleep apnea has a cumulative effect over time and is hard on your heart especially.

So, while some may help you further in this thread, to make serious progress, 'ya just gotta get that machine back or go to another DME to get one.  Heck, if it were me, even if no DME would cooperate with me, I'd get a copy of my CPAP prescription from my sleep doctor (they are required by law to give you a copy when asked), and use it to order a CPAP from one of the online suppliers out of my own pocket and find a way to pay for it somehow.

Good luck and don't quit, please.   Coffee
SuperSleeper
Apnea Board Administrator
www.ApneaBoard.com


INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.


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