Newbie to CPAP

I have just been diagnosed with moderate sleep apnea. Here is an overview of my results, as I have no idea what any of this means. 1 OSA, 50 Central, 2 Mixed, 69 Hypopnea's & 15 RERA's. I have been sent home with the RESMED 10 AUTO-PAP with settings of 6-16. I have tried to use the machine the last 3 nights with little luck. I just get ready to fall into what feels like a deep sleep and am suddenly awakened by the feeling of not being able to breath. I'm looking for any help.

First of all, welcome to the forum. Please register and register your equipment in the equipment profile. The people here can help you get your therapy under control. If you are using the ramp feature, the beginning pressure may be low enough to feel like you are not getting enough air, which often causes a feeling of panic. Just try to relax and let the machine do what it is supposed to do, which is keep your airway open so you can breathe while you sleep. It does take some getting used to, but most of us have managed to make it work for us.

Hmmm...50 centrals...that's significant.
Any mention of when they plan to follow up with you and check your data card to see how the therapy is going?
If not...get an appointment.
The chances of the AutoSet at the above pressures isn't going to help things in terms of the centrals. It can help the other stuff but it stand very little chance of eliminating the centrals.
You need to be watched closely by your doctor....note I said doctor and not DME.

In the meantime get the software so you can see yourself what is going on.
https://sleep.tnet.com/equipment

Guest wrote:I just get ready to fall into what feels like a deep sleep and am suddenly awakened by the feeling of not being able to breath.

This may be a sleep onset central or just a central happening when it feels like you are just transitioning to sleep.
Sleep onset centrals aren't usually problematic unless you have a whole bunch of them..then they are a problem.
Again...need to use the software and see for sure what is happening.

Start reading about software here.
http://www.apneaboard.com/wiki/index.ph ... SleepyHead
Then also read my SleepyHead tutorial and TX thread in the top of the Announcements section on the main forum page.

I just want to be sure which machine you have. On the machine what does it say? Autoset or VAUTO. The pressures look like autoset numbers but we need to be sure. It does look like you had a significant number of centrals. An Autoset probably will not help those but sometimes they do try the VAUTO first.
Do get the software so you can see what is happening.

It is an autoset machine. I was told by the therapist who set it up that it would ramp up from a low setting and automatically adjust the pressure to what is needed throughout the night. I do have an appointment with a sleep doctor Monday and hope that i can get a lot of my questions answered. During my sleep study they were unable to do a sleep titration because most of my events happened to late in the study, so i was told. I'm not sure if i should continue trying to use the machine or wait until i speak with the doctor.

Go ahead and use the machine. While the odds are it won't help the centrals...it wouldn't be totally impossible for it to help. Your doctor is going to want to see what's going on in terms of pressure needs for the obstructive stuff and see how many centrals are still happening and your machine can give him an idea what's going on.

You don't happen to be taking any pain medications that might suppress your respiration are you? Like opiates or something like that?

Be sure and take the SD card with you to your appointment.

Was it the Sleep Doctor that prescribed the Autoset? The AutoSet may treat the hypopneas and that may decrease your over all apnea. But they do not treat centrals and increased pressure may make them worse. You need to ask the doctor why you were given this machine.
I can't tell if you would feel better by using the machine and decreasing the hypopneas but that is possible. But you have to monitor your data with the free software and see what the results of treatment are.

The machine was listed as 1 of the 7 recommendations from the sleep doctor that did my sleep study interpretation. My PCP put the order in for the machine off his recommendations. I'm not on any medications. As far as the software, how do I set this up? I'm not sure if there will be enough information to look at. Night 1 & 2 I used the machine for about 1 to 1.5 hours. Last night I used the machine for about 2 hours.

In this situation centrals were numerous on the diagnostic sleep study....so they couldn't be caused by cpap pressure.
Sometimes when people have centrals pop up after starting cpap then the cpap pressure is the cause but you most likely have another cause since you had them on the diagnostic sleep study.

I don't know that if the pressure is going to make any difference with the centrals or not in this case ...as in make them worse since pressure didn't cause them in the first place.
The machine will ignore the centrals and won't increase the pressure trying to fix the centrals.
It will try to fix the hyponeas and any other signs of obstructive apnea stuff going on.

Your doctor will be able to look at the software data and see if this machine is helping or hurting things.
Besides...often when centrals are present insurance companies require at least a trial on the regular cpap/apap machines before they will okay the machines that can treat centrals because they are more expensive.

Use the machine so that he has something to start with in terms of what you are going to need.
Just don't be too surprise if you find that they start talking about a different machine.

Get the software up and running...if you actually slept at all during the short hours machine use there will something there that is useful.

For the software use the link that Pugsy gave you above. It will guide you through the download. Also get a written copy of your sleep Study.

If it is a problem with Central Apnea's, what type of machine is used to treat this?
And will this machine treat the other problems as well?

I hear you about the centrals. I have them due to long term narcotics use for my health condition. I was set up with a standard Pap machine at a low pressure but I'm having more and more as well so I'm back to get another sleep study so Medicare will pay for a Bi Level with backup or an ADC machine that will help me breathe when I stop. I had numerous last night 4% periodic breathing may not sound much but it can be deadly. Sadly without all the wires and sensors, you will see many of your centrals being flagged as other apneas depending on the machine. For me it shows I had 4 CA events. 50+ hypopneas when realistically all could of been central in nature. Hope you can sort it out. A good DME really helps.

There are several different options for treating central apneas and obstructive apneas.
A regular bilevel pressure machine might be tried and might get the job done.
If not there is a different bilevel machine that can get the job done....treat both problems quite easily in fact.

Bilevel means 2 distinct pressures ...your current AutoSet is what we call a single pressure machine.

The most commonly used machine for treating both centrals and obstructives is what we call an ASV machine which means Adapto Servo Ventilation. It acts like a ventilator to treat the centrals when you don't breathe on your own...and at other times it acts like a regular cpap/apap machine when responding to the obstructive stuff.

Since your DME gave you a ResMed...most likely it will be another ResMed.
Up to the doctor to decide exactly which model he wants to try but the most commonly use machine for situations like this would be the ResMed AirCurve 10 ASV. Now there are some other models he might prefer to try in the AirCurve 10 model line but this one is probably the first one we think of. A lot depends on your past history...full scope of the problem and how they want to go about addressing the problem.

All that assuming the centrals are still present after the obstructive stuff gets taken care of with the AutoSet.

I would like to thank everyone that posted here. It's reassuring to know that some people do care and that you took the time to give me advise and answer my questions. I will keep all of you updated after i meet with the sleep doctor.