Graphs in SleepyHead

[desiderata]

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[Pugsy]

Flow Limitations are reductions in air flow that don't meet criteria for an OA or hyponea flag. They are warning signs that the airway is trying to collapse. When using auto adjusting pressures the machine will increase the pressure trying to kill off flow limitations because they are unwanted.

Flow rate graph isn't particular useful in the big picture but often extremely helpful when zoomed in on because it lets us see each breath we take and the shape of the breath and trying to figure out of someone was asleep or not when something got flagged.
What you see in the big detailed picture is a highly compressed record of each breath you take. When we zoom in on it to see each breath it can answer some questions.

The other graphs you mentioned....not particularly useful. There's a wide range of normals and there's nothing really to learn from them that might impact cpap therapy.

[palerider]

So many graphs in SleepyHead! I can see the value to Events, Pressure, Leak Rate, and AHI. What I'm wondering is in what ways any of the following graphs have provided useful information in troubleshooting less-than-restorative sleep:
• Flow Limitation
• Flow Rate
• Resp. Rate
• Tidal Volume
• Insp. Time
• Exp. Time

There seems to be a lot of data there, and I'm at a loss to interpret it, or what to look for that might be indicating problems or opportunities to improve cpap treatment or maybe even general health.

• Why sleep is troubled
• where it's troubled and how
• none
• none
• none
• none

Which is why we only ask for two of those, read the "READ THIS BEFORE POSTING sticky.

[zonker]

There seems to be a lot of data there, and I'm at a loss to interpret it, or what to look for that might be indicating problems or opportunities to improve cpap treatment or maybe even general health.

there is a lot of data. but not all of it is necessary for tracking your sleep. when the experts here ask for a chart, this is what they want-

Suggested Support Order for your charts
Event Flags
Flow Rate
Pressure
Leak Rate
Flow Limit (Only for Resmed machines, not on Respironics)

this is taken from the wiki, which you can read here-

wiki/index.php/Oscar:organize

remember, oscar is the successor to sleepyhead. so just substitute sleepyhead for oscar and you'll be right.

good luck!

[desiderata]

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[Pugsy]

Given the time of the cluster I would suspect REM stage sleep being involved.
Maybe with a bit of supine sleep thrown into the mix.
If you look at the pattern of small clusters later on in the night and the increasing frequency it very closely matches up with the expected normal cycling of REM.
Normally those wee hours of the morning are when we get more REM and it's common to have REM sleep worsen the OSA and cause a need for more pressures during REM.

I am quite familiar with this pattern myself. My OSA is documented (per sleep study in a lab) to be about 5 times worse in REM than in the other sleep stages....plus I have learned that the REM probable times happen to correlate with the need for substantially more pressure during those wee hours of the morning.

If this were my report I would assume REM related...couple of events got flagged then a few minutes later the obvious arousal (which is normal after REM cycle is completed) at just past 01:38:00..and then right back to sleep (which is common because most people won't remember the arousal because it is so brief)....and then a couple of flagged events afterwards...another OA and RERA.

As to what to focus on...that's up to you as to what you are interested in and want to learn about.

When I look (which is rare) I look for evidence of arousal breathing immediately preceding flagged events which leads me to believe I wasn't asleep when the flagging happened and thus a greater chance for false positives.
I have done this a lot in the past and I figured out that about 75% of all my flagged events are arousal related and not real asleep events.
This correlates with my known history...I experience and remember a sizable number of arousals or wake ups because of back pain issues.