New to Encore Viewer: Basic questions....

Greetings, Everyone,

I just installed Encore Viewer a few days ago and am trying to make sense of the reports.
I have a low learning curve but am determined to make sense of all of this.
If anyone is able to shed light on the following questions I would be very appreciative!

Which reports and specific information/numbers should I be focusing on? The data seems overwhelming so it would be helpful if I knew what's best to check.
My large leak is 0.0, but I have an average leak of 45.0. Does that mean I'm just having alot of little leaks? Is this number within an acceptable range?
What are clear airway apenas - how are they different from obstructive airway apneas?


Thanks in advance for any help.
Tina

I look mainly at the daily detailed report. The one with the data from a single night.

Clear airway....Respironics term for central apnea... open airway cessation of breathing. A few are normal and not to be concerned with.

Leak. Look at the line itself. Hopefully minimal spikes. It is reporting Total Leak so it also includes the normal mask vent rate. The vent rate varies with pressure, the higher the pressure then the higher the vent rate. Look in your mask literature for a graph of these numbers at your pressure. 45 L/min is not a bad total leak rate average for any full face mask because they typically have a higher vent rate. I would imagine it is quite acceptable.

Example...I use the Swift FX nasal pillow. I average around 11 - 12 cm pressure (not exact since I use APAP range) and the stated vent rate at that pressure is around 35 L/min. If I was using Viewer I would see an average near that number if I had no leaks at all. I wouldn't start worrying unless I saw leaks of 65 or more for long periods of time.
Occasional spikes will happen and as long as they don't last for very long, do not impact things all that much.

Hope this helps clear up your questions. If not, let me know.

Thank you ,Pugsy, for your response.
I did not know that the leak number includes the normal venting. This is good to know!
Although my AHI is low, I am concerned because if I am reading the report correctly it looks like I am having more centrals than OA. Should I be worrked about this? Here are my numbers for last night:

CA: 4.0
OA: 1.0
H: 0.8
FL: 0.2
VS: 0.2
RE: 0.6

The CA is higher on the last four days that I checked; so it appears to be a trend. Is there something I can do to decrease my centrals; maybe increase the pressure?

Thank you in advance for your help.

Tina

In Viewer the leak reported is total leak. In SleepyHead it is total leak.
In Pro we have a choice..unintentional (above vent rate) or total leak.
ResMed machines report unintentional leak only in ResScan.

No, don't try to fix the Clear Airway events with more pressure. It won't help and could make things worse.
Did you have any history of centrals in either of your sleep studies?

Can you post an image of one of the single night's daily detailed reports? The one that shows the time line of when all the events occurred?

Don't know how to post image?
This is how I do it.

Open the image to full size so it is easily read.
I use Vista snipping tool to create a screen shot and crop the image at the same time.
Prt/scr key will also take a screen shot if using XP. If laptop is used sometimes the Fn key has to be pushed at the same time as the prt/scr key
I think windows 7 Home Premium has the snipping tool, Basic may not.
Once the screen shot is created save it in jpg format.
Upload the image to a host site. I use Photobucket it is free, there are others.
Once the image is uploaded then copy the ENTIRE IMG address. Be sure to include the opening and closing IMG in brackets. Paste that copied address into a post here.
Use the preview button. If you can't see the image try again because if you can't see it we can't.

Hi, Pugsy,

I am still trying to get my report copied on the list.
It isn't working when I try to preview the report.

I'm low tech, but have surprised myself that I have gotten this far!
Hopefully, I will have it uploaded soon.
Thanks for looking it over for me.

Tina