Hello Guest, Welcome to Apnea Board !
As a guest, you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use.
To post a message, you must create a free account using a valid email address.

or Create an Account


New Posts   Today's Posts

Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here
#21
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
k_graham Wrote:This is my first post.

A bit early but I think I can label the CPAP a success. I'm from northern Canada and we don't appear to have sleep studies - I visited the doctor at the beginning of the year due to simply feeling really poor. not sleeping well, etc. For some reason they never took a blood pressure test but did blood work and hemoglobin indications had me looking like a heavy smoker - catch is I have never smoked. So they repeated the test. My wife meanwhile had purchased a blood pressure gauge as shes had low blood pressure, one Sunday, I asked her to check mine as I wasn't feeling well and it was 180.

We made a quick trip to emergency where they gave me blood pressuure pill and a few hours later with it down to a more reasonable level I was sent on my way being told to see my doctor - I was able to get in the next day and was promptly underprescribed 1/4 pill a day. However being able to do my own blood pressure I was able to see and up the dosage to control it, a 2nd trip to the doctor for a new prescription and it was upped to 1 pill a day. They finally prescribed me for a Oximetry machine to use overnight which took a week from the hospital and 3 whole weeks later gave me a prescription to try a cpap machine.(for reference - I found out after, instead of using our hospitals Oximetry machine I could have got one via the CPAP supplier and had the results read within a week.

Anyway I was 2 weeks away from a trip to Mexico but did arrange the machine trial which should show in my Signature, now the questionable part. Within a week of being at sea level in southern Mexico near the beach with high humidity, I was able to go off my Blood Pressure pills except 1 day where it went to 140 and I think that was due to getting caught away from my CPAP machine for a couple nights.

I will know for sure after I return to Canada August 1, 2011 . Blood pressure 120/82 - pulse 83

I did not like the settings the supplier chose to begin with, it felt like rebreathed air in a closet. A call from Mexico and they suggested I turn off the humidifier but leave with water in it as apparently humidity is provided by heating the water and if anything I would prefer breathing cool air. Maybe because thats about the time I seemed to reduce my fighting the machine, is when my blood pressure dropped.

I did download the computer program and other than that it wants to access the internet (call home) which I am blocking with Zone Alarm the data looks interesting. It seems even Windows 7 firewall only blocks incoming attempts but not attempts by software to call out, if you are concerned which you should be as Trojans work this way, you should go to http://www.grc.com/lt/leaktest.htm and also use the shields up test there. The advice there includes a suggestion to download at least the free zonealarm program.

The Zonealarm message - ResWare Shell Launcher is trying to access the Internet, application ResScan.exe

I am of the feeling I want control and without the information would be wanting a different machine - with the above program I shall likely pay the price for this machine beyond the trial which is due back upon my return to Canada - I did inform the supplier of this trip in advance.

Another interesting item my monthly index is 1.2 I have the device is set to auto and was at 8 - 16, I decided to try lowering it to 0-16 to see what it would automatically set to, it would only go to 4-16 though but my apnea index last night dropped to .8 makes me wonder but I guess I need a week to see better?

One item I haven't found info about is EPR - its off on my machine - does anyone have it on?

If I am not mistaken EPR is a pressure relief for exhaling and as I am below 10 I assume its not really necessary, correct?

Anyway - now I guess while things are under control will be the time to see if weight loss or specific excercise can help further. Maybe like the coffee haulers in Mexico with a pack on the back held by a strap across the forhead, amazing they can be carrying up to a 100 kilos that way. :-/

Thanks,

Ken
Post Reply Post Reply
#22
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
Dave_KC Wrote:I've just been poking around the board, and it look interesting.

I was diagnosed about seven years ago, and the first day I used it, I was amazed at how much better I felt. My bp had been a problem, but not afterward, and I was able to then loose a significant amount of weight (like 60 lbs).

The first night with the machine, it was like I was a new man, and incredibly better at sleeping.

So, it's been great for me so far.
Post Reply Post Reply
#23
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
ttfespe Wrote:Well one month with cpap and I am very pleased. Fully compliant and have had very little problems adjusting. Every night with cpap has brought the best sleep I can remember. No more sleepy days and my memory is getting much better. I know I had serious sleep apnea for along time...just to stubborn to do anything about it...thanks to my Dr for staying after me. My sleep was so poor I was convinced I could never sleep at all with the stuff. The absolute best advice I got was at my sleep study...from the RRT..."don't over think this...just relax and go to sleep". Pretty simple but it works for me!!!! I appreciate this forum as it has really educated me and will continue to do so.
Thanks to everyone who post as u never know who u may help.
Post Reply Post Reply
#24
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
mattcaswell Wrote:After I had my heart attack 2 years ago, my dr. kept saying that I had sleep apnea. Well, being a guy, I don't want to know what I don't want to know about. About 4 months ago, after I changed jobs and now sit on my ass doing tech support on the phone, I gained weight and found that I was falling asleep during the day, even nodding out for a few seconds while on the phone.

I scheduled a sleep study and wasn't shocked when I found out my dr. was right. I was diagnosed with severe sleep apnea. I had 88 waking events in 1 hour and require a setting of 22 to eliminate them. After the study, where I was on a BiPap machine for several hours of sleep, I felt great... so I knew I needed to get a machine.

Fast forward 2 weeks and I have my ResMed S8 VPap ST and a nasal mask and now that I'm getting used to it, and stopped making the mask too tight, I'm getting very restful sleep and can't wait for the improvements in my energy levels. The results at work are already showing a very positive change. The BiPap is great because 22 in is okay, but trying to exhale against 22 is a bitch, and 16 is a much better number for exhale.

On the topic of Clinician Settings, If I'm paying for it, I should be able to know all the functions of it.. so thank you for the menu sequence for my ResMed.

I do have one question: I'm a deep inhaler and my VPap seems to choke off the in-flow before I'm ready to exhale. I can push thru it if I make an effort to keep inhaling, but I don't think I should have to do that. I can't find the Clinicians Manual to fully understand the settings. Is there a Breaths Per Minute setting or some other setting that determines how long the machine thinks the inhale should last? I would like to add about 2-4 seconds on to it... or can I turn off this "artificial" clamping of the inhale pressure?

I'm glad I found this site and thank you for your time and whatever assistance you can provide.

If you have the clinicians manual for the ResMed S8 VPap ST and are willing to share it with me, please PM me.

Matthew Caswell
Mesa, AZ
Post Reply Post Reply
#25
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
tombarelybreathing Wrote:First I would like to say Thank You!! to all of the apnea members for the information they provide especially Zonk & Supersleeper who were the first to welcome me.

I found out back in may 2011 that I had severe sleep apnea as well as periodic limb movement disorder. I stopped breathing 88 times an hour for about 20 seconds each time...and my legs and arms jumped about 65 times...so as you can imagine I was a pretty tired man. I think I've had this for about 10 years but wasn't aware of it. I just thought I was getting older and didn't have the energy that I used to. I was sick all the time..sore throats and colds and flue like symptoms. I was so tired that I was contemplating suicide just so I could get some rest!!!

I went to 3 different sleep studies and then my sleep specialist ( who is excellent) put me on a PRsystem one autoset with a modem that sent my sleep results from home to his office for one month. I felt better after only one night at the sleep study. My pressure was determined to be 8.5 and he gave me a script for a straight CPAP. I slept with the CPAP for 3 days and it just didn't work for me like the autopap that I had for the sleep study. I returned to my sleep specialist and explained to him that I felt tired again after only being on the straight CPAP for 3 days and I felt much better on the auto. He immediately wrote another script for an auto and I've slept with my Resmed S9 Autoset since then. I tried face masks and nasal pillow masks until I found one I liked...thanks to my DME.

I now feel a lot more awake and rested.I'm enjoying my life again because I'm not exhausted all day. It takes time to adjust..change doesn't happen immediately. I'm no longer sick all the time..in fact I havn't been sick since I've started cpap. I've taken the information from this forum and learned about sleep apnea and how to treat myself. I've bought a backup battery and now don't worry about what happens if the power goes out. I've learned about centrals, and obstructives and that I can read my own results with the help of the people on this forum. Thanks to all and Sleep Well!!!

Tombarelybreathing.
Post Reply Post Reply
#26
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
decrocus Wrote:Thank you so much for posting the instructions for regulating the pressure on cpap machines. Mine came back from a repair and the pressure was so high I couldn't sleep - I literally couldn't breathe. I used your instructions last night and finally this morning woke up feeling refreshed. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

I have been a cpap user for 12 years, and you know when the machine is working properly - it makes such a difference in how you feel.
Post Reply Post Reply
#27
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
Kevin1959 Wrote:Where to begin. My story starts about 10 years ago, with a wicked recording of me snoring made by my wife and turned on in the middle of the night on high volume. After I got over my extreme agitation with the sound of my own logs being cut in the middle of the night I begain the quest to obtain a CPAP. It was not an easy quest almost as hard as pulling the sword from the stone. I had to see my primary physician first to get a "referral" to see an Ear Nose and Throat doctor. Ching Ching 20 bucks. I saw the E, N and T doctor and he put me on this big machine that looked into my throat and into my ears. Thinking of this now it reminds of the scene in "Shrek" where he pulls an "earwax candle" from his ear. My E,N and T doc pulled the same big clot from my ear telling me this may fix my problems but that he was going to refer me to a pulmonolgist! Ching, Ching another 20 bucks. I made an appointment with this awesome pulmonologist from India. Our first meeting he just sat down with me and talked about my life for about 20 mins. He was all ears. He asked a couple of questions about sleepiness during the day, snoring, how I felt, my weight, that sort of thing and determined that a sleep study was in order. Ching Ching another 20 bucks but this time I had a sleep study set up.

Sleep Study: I showed up at the clinic at about 9PM on this hot summer night and they set me up with my sleep study. I am sure this is not surprise to any of you but after I got all the sensors and wires hooked up I hobbled to my "bed" to sleep. I of course did not sleep well. All those tubes and wires! However I did sleep enough for them to say I did have a mild case of apnea. but.... not severe enough for me to get a prescription (CPAP). Ching Ching another 20 bucks! I went home and told my wife and we went back to our normal course of me waking her several times a night with a restless sleep and loud snoring. After a few "disagreements" with her I called the pulmonologist up again and told him that if I did not get outfitted with a device to limit snoring that the medical community would be responsible for my next divorce! He laughed and being the all around cool doctor that he was he said that we would have to do another "sleep study" to verify.

Sleep Study 2: Round 2 begain - this time though I was outfitted with a cpap. Instead of sleeping with all the tubes and wires I slept with an old Remstar CPAP machine and just a few tubes and wires. I slept through the night and and it was determined that health would improve through the use of this new medical miricle!

Using the Remstar at home: It was not roses and chocolates to start out with. I had issues with the mask, condensation in my mask/hose, humidifier getting gross and generally just not liking sleeping with this mask and hose connected to this loud blower on my night stand. It took me months to get comfortable with it. It took me traveling to another country as part of my job and working 12-14 hour days for weeks on end to finally learn of the benefits of the CPAP machine and what it could do for me. For the first half of my month long trip I did not wear the mask and because of this I was constantly tired and fatigued. I did not sleep well and it showed. After 2 weeks I begain wearing the mask in earnest and by the time my month long stint ended I was sleeping less but more effeciently and not feeling the afternoon glicks you feel if you dont get good sleep. I had more energy and I was more alert and more in tune with what my body could really do.

Currently I am on my second Remstar which I purchased "outside" of my insurance from a local outift my awesome pulmonolgist suggested. I paid about half of what the first one cost me (I have an insurance horror story there also but that is nother story) out of my own pocket. It is the M series and is small, lightweight and can be taken with me pretty much everywhere I want to go (even camping, I built a solar powered power station to run the remstar from 12 VDC battery). My sleep patterns are pretty much the same each day. I sleep about 6 hours sometime less, I feel more alert, have lost weight and rarely have issues falling asleep. I can stay up till midnight and wake up at 530 or 6am do 10-12 hours at work come home and still have energy for other things in my life. The CPAP machine will no doubt add years to my life or at least prevent those years from being removed due to crappy sleep. I am a total proponent of the system and whole heartedly recommend anyone with poor sleep patterns to put up with the sleep studies and the referrals to get outfitted with your own unit.
Post Reply Post Reply
#28
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
jinkieskids Wrote:It's a bit early to call this a success story, but given what came before and how immediate the change was, I'm going to be bold.

About a year and a half ago I realized that I had been falling out of bed with alarming frequency. It didn't occur to me that this was abnormal (something that may indicate my mental state was already compromised). I fell out of bed when I was a child, after all. I assumed it would go away on its own.

Soon after that I began falling on my knees, instead of simply rolling out of bed. As that was extremely painful, I padded my floor, but again did nothing, putting it down to stress. Eventually it went away.

What came back were my "bouts of sleepwalking". Not only was I falling out of bed, I was _vaulting_. Literally throwing myself out of bed, probably acting out dreams. I sleepwalked into my bathroom countless times, hitting my head on the sink so often I can't believe I came away without any concussion, though given that severe exhaustion has most of the same symptoms, I may never really know. It went away too.

When it came back the third time, it was that much worse. Hitting my head, sure, but sleeping sitting up, resulting in the most wrenching back pain (I also have fibromyalgia). Suddenly I couldn't sleep for longer than a couple of hours at a time; my daytime drowsiness turned into full on passing out without warning. I don't remember what finally convinced me to demand a sleep study through my doctor, except that it wasn't ending this time. It wasn't stress or diet or depression, I was finally convinced. There was something really wrong with me, I guessed neurological. I was worried I'd end up like Mike Birbiglia, sleeping in a sleeping bag under heavy sedation with mittens on.

So imagine my surprise when they told me, on an urgent followup from the sleep study, that I had severe sleep apnea. My AHI was something like 49, my O2 sats 75. I sat up numerous times during the night. The poor clinician had to stop me sleepwalking with all the electrodes glued to my head. I was totally open to the idea of a CPAP, though terrified of stories of Vader masks and the machine "breathing for you".

Any hesitance I had dissolved two days after my diagnosis, when I sleepwalked, tripped, and hit a cabinet corner at full velocity with my jaw. Emergency confirmed it wasn't broken, but that was what prompted me to call the vendor I'd been referred to and ask for their absolute next open slot.

They gave me a ResMed S8 APAP on loan about a month ago. Immediately, I slept like a rock. No movement at all; I woke up every day in the same position I'd fallen asleep. After two weeks, the daytime drowsiness disappeared entirely. I was sleeping well for the first time in God knows how long, but it was definitely longer than my sleepwalking led me to believe.

As of last week I have my own machine, an S9 Resmed Elite, at a pressure of 16. It's magic, even better than my loan, and having gotten used to the nose pillow and to sleeping on my back, I have never felt better. I feel it will take some time to recover, REALLY recover from how much sleep I've missed out on, but regardless of the dangers of suffocation, stroke, and all other horrible side-effects of deprivation and apnea, I am positive it's saved my tripping and falling life.

And according to this machine (and assuming it's accurate), my AHI? Is now a max of 0.5. Smile I'd call that a success!
Post Reply Post Reply
#29
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
Dolla Bill Wrote:I began studying sleep cycles in the early 1970s. I learned that you have several sleep cycles a night where in each succeeding cycle, you spend more time at an Alpha (REM) level. This is where dreams occur. This is important therapy for the mind as well as the body. Research showed that when people entered the REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, they began dreaming and that if they were wakened at that time they remembered a dream.

If they were consistently wakened upon entering the REM state. They came to experience varying degrees of mood swings. Some became psychotic.

Though I have led a relatively stable life for many years, I have surprised myself by inexplicable mood swings. Large reactions to relatively minor events. Since being very focused on properly using the CPAP machine, I have not experienced these mood swings.

I also, for the first time in many years actually enjoy heading off to bed. Before, I think that I somehow intuited at a deep level, that sleep (with untreated apnea) was dangerous for me, not refreshing, not renewing. Often I would get up with only a few hours sleep and read or play games. I seemed to develop an ability to get by on just a few hours sleep.

But I now realized that I was paying a price for this activity.

My wife, at the time, told me one morning that she woke up and realized that I was not breathing for about two minutes. She thought that I had a stroke or something. She was dialing 911 to get an ambulance when I let out a powerful snore and was breathing again. I never thought about sleep apnea. This was 1975. Wish I knew then what I know now about sleep apnea!

After learning about apnea and getting focused on the therapy, I now enjoy going to bed! I now have a feeling of relaxing, refreshing, renewing and happy sleep! My life has mellowed and I feel better all over!
Post Reply Post Reply
#30
RE: Your Personal CPAP Success Story - Post Here [copied from old forum]
weeble Wrote:Still a bit early for me to be posting sucess stories...only been on CPAP since June, but I have to say from day 1, I had an immediate improvement. Not once have I whipped the mask off during the night, although I did initially have problems with dry throat and lips. I am proud to say I haven't had an afternoon snooze since I started. I do feel like I have more enegy too, although I still have to put that into practice and lose weight, but all my readings are just mind blowing. Each morning I wake up and the first thing I do is look at the AHI settings....the highest reading I have had is 1.3...the lowest, 0.3 I seem to be averaging 0.5 which is way above my expectation! I no longer have panda eyes, although they are still quite puffy (me thinks that is genetic tho) but the black circles have certainly gone. I had another sleep study done and had the pressure bumped up from 9 to 13 (I knew they had the wrong pressure in the first place but it still helped)....oh what a joy to sleep through the night and not feel like "oh just another couple of hours" Happy As!!
Post Reply Post Reply


Possibly Related Threads...
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  Help - 1 year CPAP - not success - help very welcome! leono85 36 2,365 Yesterday, 03:42 AM
Last Post: leono85
  r4robin - Therapy Thread (Help with BiLevel settings-post #5) r4robin 42 1,750 03-11-2024, 01:26 PM
Last Post: bertchintus
  First Post - Help with Settings Ideas jrudicel 3 142 03-10-2024, 12:10 PM
Last Post: jrudicel
  Has anyone had success with ONLY a soft cervical collar? ranvanman 7 520 02-26-2024, 09:49 AM
Last Post: ranvanman
  Long story short chronic 5 356 02-18-2024, 03:43 PM
Last Post: chronic
  TechieHippie's story: "mild" apnea but clusters of SpO2 drops TechieHippie 17 1,013 02-12-2024, 09:00 PM
Last Post: BoxcarPete
  First post, provider is not much help. DPAlaska 2 262 01-26-2024, 07:53 PM
Last Post: DPAlaska


New Posts   Today's Posts


About Apnea Board

Apnea Board is an educational web site designed to empower Sleep Apnea patients.