emergency use of APAP machine

I am away from my home state and temporarily don't have access to my own CPAP machine- setting 11.
A friend has offered his old machine- but it is APAP with range of 8 & 20.
I have never used APAP and "assume" that since my CPAP number is in this range that I should be fine.
Any helpful information would be appreciated. And thank you for your consideration.
letchwort2

You should be able to change the pressure on the apap machine to straight cpap mode. If you don't, you may find there are higher pressure pulses that wake you up. You may have to go into clinician mode to change the pressure type from apap to cpap. Do you know what model the machine is? That will determine how you get into clinician mode if needed.

yes that cover you need for 11 cm .. all thought it is to low a starting point .. you will probably have trouble breathing at that low a pressure ... if you can post the make and model of the machine someone here can tell you how to change the pressure to sute you needs

I see someone else posted the same thing

You should be fine with that - though your AHI might be a little higher than normal. As others have said, if you can tell us what you will be using, somebody will be able to help you change the settings.

Appreciate your help and will posts details when I see machine later today.
You are all so very kind and generous

I just switched from a CPAP to APAP machine and have found I am averaging 2-3 points lower pressure than when I was on 14 cm CPAP. This has helped to almost eliminate any leaks I was having and I think is working better overall. It's taking a little time to adjust to the lower pressure but AHI/RDI numbers are improving on APAP. There's somewhat more snores on the chart so I bump up my minimum a point and see if that clears up. APAP will work for you and you might find it works even better.

amenite wrote: APAP will work for you and you might find it works even better.

Don't say that too loudly...Wulfman might hear ya.

APAP's are also able to be set as CPAP's. APAP can also be set to the same high and low pressure, acting as a CPAP. Jim

His machine is Resmed S9 AutoSet- even have the user booklet for simple things

I was able to change his ramp setting to a much shorter time [may turn that off as I felt a bit of panic until pressure went to normal].

Got a pretty good night's sleep- may lower temperature a bit through vapor chamber- but that is explained in booklet

Never used a ResMed machine- so any help or further suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
letchworth2

That is a good machine. It has lots of data so you could get an overview of how your nights go by using Sleepyhead.

You can change the minimum ramp pressure to avoid that "struggling to get enough air" feeling that many of us get at the minimum pressure of 4 (a setting of 6 worked for me, but you'll need to get into the clinical menu - press and hold the "info" and the "setup" buttons at the same time until the clinical menu comes up - I think it takes about 3 to 5 seconds). Turning the ramp off may work well in any event - based on the settings you mentioned the machine will start at a pressure setting of 8 and increase only if it needs to.

Turning off tramping helped a great deal- as did lowering vaporous temperature. Logged 9 hours last night.
Appreciate the suggestion and directions to get into control mode- will explore that later today.

You folks have been great and very helpful, but I knew that was the case from the many hours I spent here when I first started my journey with CPAP.
letchworth2

A year ago when I was using CPAP and was hospitalized, the hospital did not hesitate to give me an APAP machine as the temporary replacement, despite my suggestion that it be set to my usual fixed pressure. It worked out fine. A year later, now that I have an automatic machine of my own, I find that the pressure averages very close to where the old machine was set and doesn't drift far in either direction.

I am finding something similar in my few days experience- thank you for your response.
Something that is a bit frustrating, especially when I first go to bed- or get up in the night-- is that I discovered the low pressure is 4 [not 8 as I was told]. I turned off the ramp as that was set to 4- but that didn't change the experience I was having of feeling like not enough air while settling in. This morning I went to admin mode and noticed that it says low pressure is 4 and high is 20.
I highlighted the 4 and hoped to change it- but apparently there is more to changing it than turning the knob when low pressure is highlighted. Can someone tell me how to change the low pressure?
I find that I am enjoying the APAP experience except for those first few minutes when 4 is definitely too low for my perception. Plus- my wife feels this is much better as it reduces the leaks and the machine is much quieter--
Thank you for your consideration and taking time to read this.
letchworth2

It's possible that the SD card contains the orders for the machine to be using that 4 cm minimum and that might be why the 4 cm change you make in the clinical setup menu doesn't hold.
I am assuming that when you are highlighting the 4 cm minimum that you are in the clinical setup menu where your turned off the ramp feature....

If you aren't in the clinical setup menu when you change the minimum pressure...you need to be there.
If you don't know how to get there....this manual explains how.
http://www.apneuvereniging.nl/forum/pdf ... manual.pdf

If you confirm you are in the clinical setup menu are and you change the minimum and you go back and look and it is still showing 4 cm instead of what you changed it to then something is overriding your change.
Remove the SD card and leave it out and try again...see if the change holds....if it does appear to hold put the SD card back in the machine and then go check the minimum pressure again....if it is back to 4 cm then that's the answer. The RX is written to the SD card in a manner that overrides your selection. If that is what has happened then you have 2 choices...make the change without the SD card being in the machine and leave it out totally....or erase the SD card manually before you put it back in the S9 so that any prior RX orders are no longer on the SD card.