Another dumb question. Flow limitation.

What is flow limitation and why do I have so much of it?
I'm also curious about what minute ventilation is as well.

I dont remember the exact numbers but a Flow Limitation is a reduction in the amout of air delivered through a slight obstruction. Not enough to be a Hypopnea. An Hypopnea wantabe!! How many is too many? Better than that many Hypopneas.

Sorry I don't know what minute ventilation.

Jerry

Since you have an S9 you may be interested in ResMed's definition of flow limitation:

http://www.resmed.com/in/clinicians/com ... nc=dealers

Wikipedia: "Respiratory minute volume (or minute ventilation, or flow of gas) is the volume of air which can be inhaled (inhaled minute volume) or exhaled (exhaled minute volume) from a person's lungs in one minute...A normal minute volume is about 5–8 liters per minute in humans."

Thanks for the link and the explanations. If I understand correctly then a flow limitation is not quite an apnea but is a reduction in the volume of air going in and can result in an apnea (or at least usually precedes one). Right?

If that's the case and I'm seeing non-stop flow limitations for an extended period but my AHI is not high (0.9) then should I be concerned about it or should I maybe bump my pressure up a little to try to fix it. When I look at the breath by breath results I'm seeing lots of times where the line flattens out but isn't lasting long enough for the machine to score it as a hypo.

I had quite a lot of flow limitations when I started out on CPAP. Most of the folks here told me not to worry about, as apparently you can get flow limitations marked when in fact you're just breathing normally (maybe a bit shallower than normal). However, I self-titrated (within a range given by the sleep doc) and found that at a higher pressure I slept better, and coincidentally (or not) the flow limitations were greatly reduced, even while AHI remained < 2 at both higher and lower pressures. Not a stupid question, and not a stupid thing to pursue either, if all other issues have been ruled out, IMHO.

Thanks echo,

I think I'll give it a few more days and watch how it goes. I'm adjusting to the therapy and finally sleeping sound and experiencing REM rebound. (not to mention talking in my sleep which is not normal for me). With this I'm seeing more flow limitations and an increased AHI. It may be that now that I'm sleeping sound with cpap I might need a slightly higher pressure then I was tirated with.

I'm so glad I found this forum. I would have never figured all this out on my own. Everyone here is great and so willing to help.