Taking mask off and on during the night question

I'm just wondering. Last night I was sick as anything. I did not escape the pukey karma of my darling daughter. I went to bed early, was feverish, shivering, all that fun stuff...I had the mask on though.

By 11pmish til about 3am I was up and down and in and out of the loo (bathroom) so often I eventually gave up putting the mask on and taking it off (given the speed at which I needed to get to said loo). Around 3ish I did manage to settle enough to have it on for a few hours.

Does turning it on and off over and over again affect the readings? (leak rate and such).

Second question:. I'm still adjusting to this thing so I still have the ramp feature set (for 10 minutes), when I'm in a situation where I'm up and down such as I was (or sometimes in the middle of the night when I need to settle a nightmare for a little person) is there a way just to go straight back to my setting or do I need to keep it at the ramping thing all the time. (I'm just wondering if there is a quick way to get it back to no ramp)

Third question (related to the others). When the little ones come in at night sometimes for a snuggle or hug with a nightmare or whatever I can't actually talk to them because when I open my mouth the whole seal thing goes wanky and I literally feel like I'm choking. Sometimes I'll just take off the mask. Does this register as a leak? It has the auto on/off feature so it does turn itself off at some point but if it's only for a quick word I'll just take of the mask, say whatever I need to say and put it back on.

I've been on CPAP for 7 weeks and found that i also ditched my mask a few nights. I found that once my doc increased my pressure I started keeping it on. Do you know what pressure you are using and what pressure you were titrated at?

In my experience turning the machine on/off for breaks does not seem to affect the numbers.

I'm not sure about the ramp i never used it with the Elite II as the exhale relief is very good so its easier to get used to without the ramp.

When the little ones come it, taking your mask off will contribute towards your leak rate. However when you or your doc use the resmed rescan software to print out your stats you will see a total leak and a 95th percentile leak rate. The leaks caused by removing your mask will be in the total figure but your more realistic leak rate will be indicated by the lesser 95th percentile leak rate. I'm assuming you turn the machine off soon after just removing your mask.

Also a couple of other points (information passed on to me) if the leak rate is high 0.50L or above the other readings are not considered accurate.
The Elite II machine really needs over 4 hours of nightly usage for the data to be considered accurate/useful.

No doubt someone will correct me if i'm wrong

Maybe I'll try it tonight without the ramping. I"m only set at 7 and I swear to god...if I wake up in the middle of the night the only reason I know it's actually pushing air is to pull it from my nose or look at the machine. It doesn't bother me at all and has kinda become part of my breathing I guess.

Yes...I think I will try that tonight. I do find the first minute or so of the ramping it's almost difficult to breath until the pressure is up a bit, so maybe it's for the best if I just get used to it without the ramp.

Most of the time I just smack the off button when the kids come in because I really do feel like I'm going to choke if I try and talk with it going so it's not off my face for long before being turned off. Most of the time I turn it off prior to opening my mouth though.

Good to know that turning it off and on during the night is no biggie just in case. That's the first time since I got it a week ago monday I had to just leave it off...and it was more the nuisance factor of me being sick than the mask itself.

I take it you have access to the clinical menu to get the stats? if so another good thing to check is the mask type to make sure that is right.

How did you do with the ramp off?

I found i was still ditching the mask at 7cm even with the ramp off. If you find yourself doing the same call your doc he might tell you to increase your pressure.

Last night was tough. I was really excited and revved up when I finally got to bed. Husband was sleeping so I didn't want to fiddle with buttons.

Will try tonight though.

[quote][/quoteI'm just wondering. Last night I was sick as anything. I

By 11pmish til about 3am I was up and down and in and out of the loo (bathroom)
Does turning it on and off over and over again affect the readings]

Ah, you just gave me flashbacks!!!!! In January, I had a wonderful Samonella experience requiring so many tidy bowl embraces, I'm facing charges for flushing tidy bowl...... Anyway, trying to be "compliant" night one of the exerience, I removed and replaced my mask 9 times in 4 hours for tidy bowl hugs!!!!! Missed 4 hour compliance by 7 minutes..darn it...my only less than 4 hours use since day one!!!! The following night, I spent most of the sleep time in the ER getting juiced up....then slept before the next round......for a week I had lots of ups and downs during the night.........I now have perfect data for all my tidy bowl and ER visits during my illness.

For the data, when I look at the summary data, there is a list of mask on/off times when mousy lurks over the graphics. Obviously the apneas and hypoapenas are not present as I really didn't sleep those moments between being up and down repeatedly. Compliance data of time is slightly skewed because mask is on/machine on...but no sleep......I turned my machine off, but the leaks when mask is removed is shown by a obvious spike in leak and inverted spike in pressure decrease.....my take on my data crisis........is now that tidy bowl is still circling the sewer system, my skewed data is not seriously affected as it's a part of the averages of the data. I'll always know and can report that week was a definite "off" week even on XPAP compliance!(minus 7 minutes)!! Now that almost 3 months have pasted the data average is less affected since "normal" data has increased greatly. Normal data, limits the affects of "off week" data on the averages. Unexpectedly, I will always have a record of the Salmonella resulting in Tidy Bowl rage!!!!