S9 VPAP ST-A OSCAR Data Question

[gadgetmaniah]

Some pictures from today. I changed the Trigger setting back to High from Very High. I feel better today though not sure if it's due to changing the trigger setting. Still struggling a bit with residual sleepiness however.

[gadgetmaniah]

I'm curious about this breathing pattern that I can always see in my sleep where the exhalation seems to be longer and the flow rate looks larger than usual. The pattern starts around 11:07:20 in this picture:

   

Here is a zoomed out section of this period. Another thing that I have noticed is that it always corresponds with an increased respiration rate and ends with what looks like an arousal and mini apnea:

   

   

I am assuming that this is normal though and probably has to do with something like dreaming.

By the way, I've increased my pressure support to 6 since the past couple of days and that seems to be suiting me better. I'll continue with it for some more days to see if the improvement is consistent. Thankfully I'm not experiencing many UAs which I feared I would if I increased the PS to more than 5.

[gadgetmaniah]

Does anyone know what this breathing pattern indicates? I used my Autoset machine today and whenever I use it I can see periods of breathing where my flow rate graphs looks like this. It is always accompanied by an increased respiratory rate. Could it be that the machine is just miscounting the breaths?

   
   

Similar periods happen when I use the S9 VPAP as well, though the breaths do not look as deformed:

   

[pholynyk]

While I haven't looked at the code, I believe OSCAR is counting the zero crossings, of which there are many in each breath in your samples.

In your samples, measuring the time between maxes or mins would be a more accurate result. I'm not sure how that wold generalise to less regular waveforms.

[gadgetmaniah]

Thanks for the reply. So do these breathing periods indicate something like flow limitation?

Not sure if relevant, but I've noticed that my inspiration time is generally greater than my expiration time too on the AS10 Autoset, including during these periods.