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It’s fine to keep the EPAP min of 7.0. Pressure and pressure support will overcome flow limitations, even those in the nose. Many people are able to use nasal therapy that believe they are mouth breathing. It makes a big difference and you may not need the septoplasty.
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.
Machine: ResMed Aircurve 10 VAUTO Mask Type: Full face mask Mask Make & Model: Phillips Dreamware Humidifier: Built in CPAP Pressure: unsure CPAP Software: OSCAR
I ended up with a sleep wedge that looks promising and a lower pillow to round it all out. I am throwing the kitchen sink at this, leaving no doubts!!!!
The ENT that diagnosed the deviated septum was pretty surprised how bad mine was, for as long as it had been. The entire left side of my nose may allow 5-10% air to get through. That causes turbinates to swell on the right side which shuts it substanitially. They gave me a steroid that opens the right side up a little bit but the rebound off of the meds is worse than when I started.
Long story short, the goal is to get everything "back to stock" so I can start whittling away the mental stuff.
With the small taste of how the first night on the new machine went, I am really excited to get this all sorted out. I can't thank everyone enough in this forum, you are doing great work for a lot of people!
Machine: ResMed Aircurve 10 VAUTO Mask Type: Full face mask Mask Make & Model: Phillips Dreamware Humidifier: Built in CPAP Pressure: unsure CPAP Software: OSCAR
The sleeping wedge was a no go on the first and only night (3/20). Not real comfortable sleeping on an incline and did little to stop what appeared to be the positional apneas. The pillow prides itself on being adjustable for back, side and stomach sleepers. I left it as is for the first night while sleeping on the wedge, probably too much stuffing initially. The pillow was addressed on the second night by removing about 1/3 of its contents. It feels to be a much flatter, leaving me in a much better position to keep me from tucking my chin. The last two nights, I also used a soft collar. On 3/21, I had ONE hypopnea and eded up with a 0.16 AHI. The collar is certainly something to get used to as the neck was a little sore in the morning. The duration of sleep was a little disappointing but I guess it is probably a matter of getting used to the collar. I was also still getting large spikes with my pulse that appears tied to a little movement and arousals throughout the night. Weighted blanket was ordered to try and limit some of the movement.
On 3/22, with the bilevel, collar and weighted blanket, I finally achieved the illusive 0.0 AHI with a 7hr+ sleep time! My flow limits are barely perceptible and is reflected in in my lower desaturations. My pulse is still all over the place, albeit the window that had ranged from 44-111 over the last 30 days was 47-98 last night.
I may tweak the pressures down a little bit to help clean up the leaks some but those don't look overly concerning, I think.
Anything else seen that I could possibly wring out of the current settings? I think the improvements are getting pretty slim with the machine, so once this variable is maxxed out I can start focussing my attention elswhere!
Side note-The 3/21 graph was cropped to remove a test session during the day. The blower motor on my "new" 3642hrs Autocurve was making some weird noises the previous night during the higher pressure sessions. Swapped the motor out with my Autoset 10 until Amazon could deliver a new motor. The new motor was installed yesterday and was amazingly quiet last night.
And kudos to the Craigslist seller, I sent him a video of the motor noise and he sent me a credit for it's cost! Good people are still out there.
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.
