Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

General Discussion on any topic relating to CPAP and/or Sleep Apnea.
JSG
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:52 am

Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by JSG » Thu Oct 16, 2014 12:01 pm

Hi, everyone.

I've been looking at my data on SleepyHead, and something is happening consistently: halfway through the night, I start having a prolonged--that is, for 1 or 2 hours--large leak, and I finally wake up. The weird thing is that I don't get the large leak until an hour or two after I fall asleep. Obviously, since I'm asleep, I don't know what is causing it. I might be jostling the mask with my hand, or perhaps my head is rolling. The only thing I can think of to do is to buy an infrared camera to film myself while I am sleeping to get to the bottom of this. Have any of you had this problem? How did you solve it?

Thanks!
****************************************
Philips Respironics BiPAP Auto Bi-Flex System One
Fisher & Paykel Simplus Full Face CPAP Mask
BiPAP Pressures: 20/16
Humidifier Level: 5

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Denial Dave
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Location: Connecticut

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by Denial Dave » Thu Oct 16, 2014 12:14 pm

My bet is your leaks are related to your face's position on the pillow after you fall asleep

it may be time to consider changing to a pillow that keeps your face lifted slightly. It'll prevent the pillow from "shoving" the mask to one side and causing leaks

Dave

_________________
Mask: Mirage Quattro™ Full Face CPAP Mask with Headgear
Humidifier: S9™ Series H5i™ Heated Humidifier with Climate Control
Additional Comments: Started at VPAP pressure setting of 20/14.4. I've survived Stage 1 cancer and lost 80+ lbs. Pressure is now 14.5 / 11
if you don't know where you are going... any road will take you there.... George Harrison

JSG
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:52 am

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by JSG » Thu Oct 16, 2014 12:16 pm

Hi, Dave.

That's what I think, too. I bought a buckwheat pillow. It's kind of small (which was difficult to tell initially, since I purchased it through Amazon). What do you suggest?

Josh
****************************************
Philips Respironics BiPAP Auto Bi-Flex System One
Fisher & Paykel Simplus Full Face CPAP Mask
BiPAP Pressures: 20/16
Humidifier Level: 5

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Denial Dave
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Location: Connecticut

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by Denial Dave » Thu Oct 16, 2014 12:41 pm

The buckwheat is a nice pillow and works for some folks.

Bed pillows are a lot like CPAP masks.... what works for one person may not work for another.

I tried a bunch of different regular, buckwheat & CPAP specific pillows and was never happy.

So I grabbed my mask one Saturday morning and headed to the local bedding store. I tried every pillow they had in the store while wearing my mask

LOL

I settled on a temperpedic symphony model pillow for my use.

_________________
Mask: Mirage Quattro™ Full Face CPAP Mask with Headgear
Humidifier: S9™ Series H5i™ Heated Humidifier with Climate Control
Additional Comments: Started at VPAP pressure setting of 20/14.4. I've survived Stage 1 cancer and lost 80+ lbs. Pressure is now 14.5 / 11
if you don't know where you are going... any road will take you there.... George Harrison

Guest

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by Guest » Thu Oct 16, 2014 12:51 pm

JSG wrote:Hi, everyone.

I've been looking at my data on SleepyHead, and something is happening consistently: halfway through the night, I start having a prolonged--that is, for 1 or 2 hours--large leak, and I finally wake up. The weird thing is that I don't get the large leak until an hour or two after I fall asleep. Obviously, since I'm asleep, I don't know what is causing it. I might be jostling the mask with my hand, or perhaps my head is rolling. The only thing I can think of to do is to buy an infrared camera to film myself while I am sleeping to get to the bottom of this. Have any of you had this problem? How did you solve it?

Thanks!
I would suggest two things...
  • 1. You post your daily graph to show when your leak begins.
    2. Adjust your mask at your highest pressure before you go to bed.

JSG
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:52 am

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by JSG » Thu Oct 16, 2014 7:52 pm

Why would posting the graphs help? I think I'm probably knocking the mask with my hand or having my head roll to the side. The graphs aren't going to give you information on either one.

Are you suggesting I increase the pressure? What do you mean by "highest" pressure? The highest pressure the machine will produce? If I did that, I would stop using the mask altogether, because that pressure blows my face away like I'm in a fighter jet. Also, I don't think it would solve the problem of my hand knocking the mask or my head rolling to one side.
****************************************
Philips Respironics BiPAP Auto Bi-Flex System One
Fisher & Paykel Simplus Full Face CPAP Mask
BiPAP Pressures: 20/16
Humidifier Level: 5

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cathyf
Posts: 515
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 11:56 am

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by cathyf » Thu Oct 16, 2014 8:13 pm

The point about the pressures is wondering if the pressure is going up before the leaks. If that's what's happening, the causal chain can be something like:

1) go into rem sleep and start with snores and need higher pressures

2) with the higher pressure, THEN the mask gets blown off.

I did that my very first night on the machine!

If that's the problem, it's pretty simple to see and simple to fix -- you need to get the mask on tight enough to ride out the elevated pressures. If it's not happening that way, then tightening the mask probably isn't going to help and could be fairly unpleasant.

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Wulfman...
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Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by Wulfman... » Thu Oct 16, 2014 9:46 pm

JSG wrote:Hi, everyone.

I've been looking at my data on SleepyHead, and something is happening consistently: halfway through the night, I start having a prolonged--that is, for 1 or 2 hours--large leak, and I finally wake up. The weird thing is that I don't get the large leak until an hour or two after I fall asleep. Obviously, since I'm asleep, I don't know what is causing it. I might be jostling the mask with my hand, or perhaps my head is rolling. The only thing I can think of to do is to buy an infrared camera to film myself while I am sleeping to get to the bottom of this. Have any of you had this problem? How did you solve it?

Thanks!
From that description, it's probably related to being in a deep or REM stage sleep.
If it doesn't happen all the time, it may not be worth worrying about.
Could be the bed pillow pushing the mask out of whack.

Oh, yeah.......been there, done that. Doesn't happen all the time. Haven't had any occurrences recently, but I don't worry about it, either. It just "happens" occasionally and then goes away for quite awhile. I don't recall it ever waking me up. I just see the evidence in my reports in the morning.
I also have my machine set to not turn off during a large leak. That way, the air keeps blowing and I'm still getting SOME therapy.


Den

.
(5) REMstar Autos w/C-Flex & (6) REMstar Pro 2 CPAPs w/C-Flex - Pressure Setting = 14 cm.
"Passover" Humidification - ResMed Ultra Mirage FF - Encore Pro w/Card Reader & MyEncore software - Chiroflow pillow
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JSG
Posts: 15
Joined: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:52 am

Re: Halfway through the night, the large leaks start.

Post by JSG » Wed Oct 22, 2014 9:43 am

Well, I bought a cheapish infrared camera and filmed myself last night to figure out what was happening. Right before the "event"--that is, the point where my well-behaved SleepyHead AHI graph changes into 2.5 hours of large leak territory--I pick my head up and slam it back into the pillow.

Curiously, I have fallen into a fairly predictable pattern, according to the data: If I sleep for about x minutes before the large leak occurs, I sleep for approximately x minutes with a large leak, and then I wake up. So, for instance, if I sleep for 60 minutes before the large leak, I sleep for about 60 minutes with a large leak, and then I wake up. If I sleep for 2.5 hours before the large leak, I then sleep for about 2.5 hours with a large leak, and then I wake up. This is not an exact analysis, but this is a pretty good model of the pattern.

My guess is that I simply have to live with this. Well, mystery solved.
****************************************
Philips Respironics BiPAP Auto Bi-Flex System One
Fisher & Paykel Simplus Full Face CPAP Mask
BiPAP Pressures: 20/16
Humidifier Level: 5