New user needs advice

[Julie]

You can change the pressure as often as you want to. Period.

About the humidifier - it's a convenience for those who need it, when they need it (diff. times of the year maybe) but many never use it at all - it's not therapy in itself. If you're in a humid climate or season, you may not need it or only want a bit, in winter with central htg you may want more. Too much when you don't need = congestion, not enough and you have other symptoms.

[GEG]

Julie, I was just teasing about the changes. Before receiving my machine I had been doing a lot of reading of the board and saw lots of people afraid to make changes because they were not allowed. I am not that kind, at all!

I do think I need the humidifier, both at home and at many of the places I will be traveling to. For me getting a good understanding of how it works will help me make the adjustments when needed for each new environment. At home I don't have AC, but when traveling I do. That will affect the moisture needed. It also will affect the temperature of the room, as at home I don't have as much of an ability to make adjustments. With my travel schedule, I need to become an expert quickly on figuring out each various situation so that I can get the sleep I need to function during the day.


Pugsy, I do have a heated hose and the manual, but it just didn't seem to explain it as far as if the humidity setting affects just moisture or both moisture and heat. I may lower the heated hose tonight (maybe even turn it off) and see how I do. I do also wonder, since it only seems to affect me when I first put it on, if not preheating the water might be a good first step. I will test out a few things and see what works.

I do know my situation is somewhat unique with the amount of travel and variety of places I am in. I want to learn/adjust as much as I can with the machine itself as soon I will have to figure out the whole traveling with the machine, fitting it in with my luggage, setting it up at various locations, deciding if I put it away if housekeeping will be coming in, etc.

[palerider]

Thanks Julie. I was leaning toward that, I just don't want to go too far, too fast, for some reason. I think it is more a mental block. Just getting confirmation that it makes sense to do that gives me the confidence to just do it.

it only takes a couple minutes to lower the pressure back down, ya know

Are you sure?? I thought once a pressure was set, you had to stick with it for at least 30 days, or the DME police would come after you?!!

they'll break down your door at 4am and shoot your goldfish for "threatening" them. they're bastards like that.

"that goldfish had a gun!"

[palerider]

Pugsy, I do have... the manual,

the clinician manual, or the 'user' manual?... or both?

[Pugsy]

The clinical manual may explain the heated hose/humidity thing better than the regular user manual.
Is the manual that you have the one that came with the machine for users or did you go get the clinical manual?
You can request it here (the clinical manual) if you don't have it.
http://www.apneaboard.com/adjust-cpap-p ... tup-manual

I haven't looked at the DreamStation manual real close so I don't know if that heated hose/humidity thing is like my PR S1 heated hose thing but the PR S1 I am personally familiar with how it works.
With the PR S1 there is no "auto" humidity thing. They just have 3 different humidity levels and 5 different hose temperature selections.
For humidity...1 is 70%, 2 is 80% and 3 is 90%.
For temperature the 5 settings available and 1 is 4 degrees above the ambient room temp with 5 being 16 degrees above the ambient room temp.
I assume the DreamStation offers something similar. Respironics doesn't seem to vary much from an original concept.

I don't have the time right now to go digging in the clinical manual for the DreamStation but I will try to find some time later and see if I can glean anymore pertinent information on what it offers.

I've never really bothered with the preheat function. Don't know why I don't...maybe because it just isn't that big of a deal for me and I forget it's available.
But you should be able to lower the hose air temp and keep the humidity higher if that is what you wish.
Only drawback will be an increased chance of condensation in the hose or mask should you happen to be somewhere that the ambient room temp is on the cool side. Easily remedied if that should happen.

I found that my nasal mucosa really need the added moisture and lots of it. Don't know why because where I live it isn't particularly a low humidity area...but I just do. I found that out when I tried a much lower setting and had horrible nasal symptoms...repeated a few times over the years when I have forgotten to add water to the chamber and the darn thing went dry in the middle of the night. So added moisture is a critical part of my therapy. I have often said (and I mean it) that if my humidifier died and I didn't have a spare that I would go without the therapy before I would use the machine without the added moisture. I can get over the apnea events happening without therapy easier and faster than I can get over what happens to my nasal mucosa when they get dried out.

Keep playing with the settings and you will get it figured out as to what your nose needs and wants.
When it comes to hose air temp and humidity setting there really is no right or wrong....there's only what works for each person individually and it's something you have to sort through on your own. There's a wide range in preferences and needs and all are "normal" because in this situation there are no hard fast rules.

[GEG]

I do have the clinical manual, I requested and downloaded it the day my unit arrived. It doesn't answer my questions.

[2kittymom]

I have a Resmed S9 Autoset. When I began therapy, it was set to the pressure of 11. A couple of years ago, in talking to someone on CPAP for a long time, he said he changed to the adjustable pressure and loved it. I took my machine in and had the clinician change mine. I too love it. Seldom do I ever even go up to 10. My personal opinion, perhaps, but why have a set pressure, when you can just have the pressure you require? Just asking. Thanks.

[palerider]

I have a Resmed S9 Autoset. When I began therapy, it was set to the pressure of 11. A couple of years ago, in talking to someone on CPAP for a long time, he said he changed to the adjustable pressure and loved it. I took my machine in and had the clinician change mine. I too love it. Seldom do I ever even go up to 10. My personal opinion, perhaps, but why have a set pressure, when you can just have the pressure you require? Just asking. Thanks.

some people have a thoroughly unsubstantiated idea that the slow gradual pressure adjustments the machine masks somehow can startle people out of "a deeper sleep stage", without actually understanding sleep stages, or anything.

doesn't really matter though, it's an option, and if someone wants to use it, more power to 'em. sometimes just thinking "it's better for me" works (the placebo effect).

[GEG]

So I am going to post a few more nights of results. Things have improved a little, but it seems they could still get better. Time to go up a little? My trip was delayed a day, so I have 2 more nights at home, so would like to do what I can.






Any thoughts would be appreciated!

[palerider]

So I am going to post a few more nights of results. Things have improved a little, but it seems they could still get better. Time to go up a little?

I'd bump up the min another cm.

also, you can change the left scale of the flow strip, instead of making it really huge. just right click the vertical scale.

[GEG]

I was thinking that bumping it up 1 was a good idea, once again, just wanted some thoughts from those more knowledgeable about this than I.

As far as the second part, I am not sure I am following you. Are you saying I can make the range of the flow rate chart smaller, so that more detail can be seen? If that is what you are referring to, I went and figure that out and put it on -35 to 35, figuring that would capture anything relevant. Here is what it looks like, is this what you were saying, or am I off in left field?? lol



Thanks again for the quick and helpful response.

[palerider]

As far as the second part, I am not sure I am following you. Are you saying I can make the range of the flow rate chart smaller, so that more detail can be seen? If that is what you are referring to, I went and figure that out and put it on -35 to 35, figuring that would capture anything relevant. Here is what it looks like, is this what you were saying,

you had a flow chart with all the trace squished into a small smudge in the middle, looks like you expanded the chart itself so you could see a bit of detail. so I pointed out that you can change the auto scaling which is sometimes thrown off by brief spikes, and not have to make the chart take up a third of the screen to see the same amount of detail...

so, in short, yeah, that's what I meant.

[GEG]

Thanks