Sleepyhead:Does this look normal? Clusters of centrals, etc.

[rebeccamakesthings]

I've been using the CPAP for a little more than a month now and seem to be doing pretty well. Most nights my AHI is around 1 or 2, and it's never been higher than about 4. I've even had a few nights with zero.

All in all, I think CPAP's been a BIG success.

That said, lately I've started noticing brief periods where things get pretty dicey. When it happens, for 15 to 20 minutes or so, I get a bunch of events occurring at fairly even intervals. Most of the events show up as CAs in Sleepyhead. It also looks like there might be some hypopnea happening that isn't getting flagged.

A couple questions for any Sleepyhead gurus out there.

1. I don't snore (per my sleep study) and only had hypopneas (and a couple centrals that the sleep doc wrote off) when I was diagnosed in my sleep study. Is it normal to see most of the hypopneas disappear but instead get full apneas using the CPAP?

2. Specific to the charts below -- these are what I'm talking about with the "dicey periods." Does this look like periodic breathing? I do have a genetic connective tissue disorder that can (rarely) cause neurological problems.





Any insight would be awesome. Thanks.

[Pugsy]

They don't look like periodic breathing to me....look more like maybe post arousal or halfway awake pauses in breathing.

To really evaluate periodic breathing (or what everyone gets in a panic over CSR..which your machine would flag if you were having CSR and there's none) you need to be zoomed in closer.

Like go to the events tab and find the central flagged at 7:10 something and click on it and then the graph will zoom in at the level really needed for PB evaluation...and you will likely see the second CA in the same graph.

[rebeccamakesthings]

Thanks Pugsy.

This is what that first graph looks like when zooming in the way you suggested. (I hadn't realized the events tab would allow this -- thanks for the tip!)