Back to CPAP for UARS, help interpreting graphs

[dcg494]

Hi everyone, great to be back on the forum here ! I was on here for years, until i had multilevel surgery 4 years ago. Well guess what, it didn't help as much as i was hoping. 

So i'm back on CPAP for UARS and, predictably, felt great the first week, now struggling with getting my therapy right. 

Biggest problem is that I can only tolerate a low pressure, currently at 5.4 IPAP with 3 EPR (Airsense for her). 

I'm going to slowly ramp up the pressure to as much as i can, but for now i was hoping someone could help me interpret my graphs a bit. 

- 1st picture of the whole night -- looks fine overall, low AHI as expected from UARS 

   

-- 2nd snapshot of a seemingly normal flow rate during the night ? Would be great to get someone to confirm this looks fine

   

-- 3rd picture of when i gets a bit more messy -- appreciate any and all feedback on this and what i'm looking at here / what i might do to fix it

   


Thanks a lot !!

[BoxcarPete]

Most everything looks fine to me. Flow rates always get a little chaotic during REM sleep, so your third picture doesn't look like anything to be alarmed about.

Keep ramping up the pressure. You won't get the full benefit of pressure support until you get to at least 7cm H2O, which is mostly what you are looking for to help with airway resistance if you have minimal obstructive events.

[dcg494]

Thanks a lot for the response ! Good to know the flow curves look fine. 

Really wish i could ramp up the pressure more, today had major bloating again. Possible that 5.4cm is all i can get now :

I'm surprised it even does anything. It's definitely helping though, I can tell by my heart rate / stress levels on my fitness tracker at night. 

Does anyone have a theory maybe as to why ? Is it maybe just overcoming the nasal obstruction and reducing turbulent air flow overall maybe making collapse less likely ? 

I can't imagine that 5.4cm pressure is stinting my airway open further down..