Fatigued 29M. Undiagnosed but believe I have a sleep disorder. I did a ApneaLink Air home study results below. But

[Dylanmatthew]

I'm not convinced I don't have sleep apnea due to how horrible I feel all day especially in the mornings I find it hard to wake up. I'm fatigued and feel awful all the time. Depressed and anxious too. http://imgur.com/a/ac8s5TH results of home study.

I bought a Watchpat One off Lofta.com and now I'm 2nd guessing spending $200 almost on this thing and wondering if it's worth doing or send it back. I need help...

[Pugsy]

You don't meet the criteria for a diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnea. Not even close or borderline.

Doesn't mean that you don't have some other kind of sleep disordered breathing issue of which OSA is but one item in the sleep disordered breathing list.

I doubt that the results from the Watch Pat One is going to be markedly different. The ResMed home sleep study is considered to be highly accurate.

I would suggest seeing a doctor about your fatigue and start with the usual basic stuff and go from there.

Usual starting questions.

How many hours of sleep do you average?
Are those hours of sleep fragmented by very many wake ups?
Do you take any medications (even OTC) for any reason? If so what?
Any other physical or mental health issues?
What symptoms make you think OSA? Just fatigue?? Any excessive daytime sleepiness?

[Dylanmatthew]

You don't meet the criteria for a diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnea. Not even close or borderline.

Doesn't mean that you don't have some other kind of sleep disordered breathing issue of which OSA is but one item in the sleep disordered breathing list.

I doubt that the results from the Watch Pat One is going to be markedly different. The ResMed home sleep study is considered to be highly accurate.

I would suggest seeing a doctor about your fatigue and start with the usual basic stuff and go from there.

Usual starting questions.

How many hours of sleep do you average?
Are those hours of sleep fragmented by very many wake ups?
Do you take any medications (even OTC) for any reason? If so what?
Any other physical or mental health issues?
What symptoms make you think OSA? Just fatigue?? Any excessive daytime sleepiness?

I do remember when I did the ApneaLink home study I slept pretty well but I woke up once and noticed the nasal cannula disconnected so I reconnected it. But I'm glad you replied to me. I feel I should just return the watchpat one to Lofta since I didn't open it yet. I'm tempted to just do it but I feel if I get similar results I would have wasted money...my ENT prescribed me the ApneaLink Air.

Maybe I have UARS? Hypothyroidism? My tsh was 3.3.
I sleep on average 6.5 to 7.5 hours of sleep. I have a fitbit Charge 4 and it shows I wake up multiple times at night that I don't remember but it's a fitbit and isn't highly accurate.
I take a low dose of Lexapro for many years. I'm depressed and anxious.

Here is the thing. I don't feel like taking naps often or sleeping during the day but I feel fatigue and malaise. Lots of blood testing was done. I usually always have low vit D.
I guess I need a new doctor. I'm fairly skinny too. Like 161lbs. 5'11"

[Pugsy]

Dig deep on the Lexapro side effects.

https://www.nami.org/About-Mental-Illne ... -(Lexapro)

Common side effects

Headache, nausea, diarrhea, dry mouth, increased sweating, feeling nervous, restless, fatigue, or having trouble sleeping (insomnia).

https://www.healthline.com/health/depre ... de-effects

https://www.rxlist.com/lexapro-side-eff ... center.htm

https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supple ... 063707?p=1

unusual tiredness or weakness
among others

Lexapro belongs to a class of medications called SSRIs.
SSRIs are notorious for messing with sleep in general. Lots of arousals and/or not getting the needed amounts of deep sleep or REM sleep.

Google "SSRIs and sleep " and start reading. Tons of literature available.
Here are a couple

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15892588/

https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/e ... ants-sleep

Now of course the very problem you take Lexapro for could also be a factor in your fatigue.
One of the main symptoms of depression is fatigue. Then they give us a medication which is well known to cause fatigue or sleep problems.
Sort of damned if you do and damned if you don't kind of thing.

Is this the sole source of your problem??? We can't know for sure but there is a reason one of the first questions we ask people is about meds and other health issues.

I suggest having a good chat with your doctor. Medication side effects are quite common causes of not feeling so great.
We see it all the time with people on cpap and their reports show good therapy but they complain of feeling like crap.

Fatigue is a very common side effect for a lot of meds. My own BP med has a fatigue side effect.

[Dylanmatthew]

Did you notice it said I had 53 snoring events in my home study? I feel like that's proof of sleep apnea isn't it? Wish my ENT knew more.
I've been taking Lexapro for 7 years and didn't experience the fatigue and malaise I have been for the past 3 years. 3 years ago I went cold turkey off Lexapro and felt OK for 2 months then BAM so many horrible awful symptoms hit me and I reinstated Lexapro at a small dose and haven't felt the same since 2018...

[Pugsy]

53 snoring events over 7 1/2 hours recording time really isn't all that horrible. Not quite 8 per hour average.
No desats to speak of above normal slight reductions when asleep.

Snores or lack of isn't really factored in when establishing criteria for a diagnosis of OSA.
People can snore horribly and not have OSA and there are people with severe OSA that don't snore at all.

Now snores can disturb a person's sleep though.

There's nothing stopping you from buying a cpap/apap machine and giving it a try and seeing if it helps your unwanted symptoms or not. You don't meet the criteria for OSA diagnosis. Doesn't mean you don't have some other sleep disordered breathing issue. Just means no clear cut OSA.
People do use cpap to reduce snores though. Insurance won't pay though and you have to go outside the medical system and do it yourself. People do it.

UARS is also a possibility but that is a really hard diagnosis to make unless someone has an in lab sleep study with a Pes device.

[Julie]

One thing that relieves snores and some apnea is doing whatever you can to not sleep on your back (or flipping to it overnight) and there are tricks to help, like wearing something (back with towels or foam wedge) to keep it from happening.

[Dylanmatthew]

53 snoring events over 7 1/2 hours recording time really isn't all that horrible. Not quite 8 per hour average.
No desats to speak of above normal slight reductions when asleep.

Snores or lack of isn't really factored in when establishing criteria for a diagnosis of OSA.
People can snore horribly and not have OSA and there are people with severe OSA that don't snore at all.

Now snores can disturb a person's sleep though.

There's nothing stopping you from buying a cpap/apap machine and giving it a try and seeing if it helps your unwanted symptoms or not. You don't meet the criteria for OSA diagnosis. Doesn't mean you don't have some other sleep disordered breathing issue. Just means no clear cut OSA.
People do use cpap to reduce snores though. Insurance won't pay though and you have to go outside the medical system and do it yourself. People do it.

UARS is also a possibility but that is a really hard diagnosis to make unless someone has an in lab sleep study with a Pes device.

Thank you for replying and clarifying it for me. Perhaps I have a vitamin deficiency, hypothyroidism or I actually am just really really depressed after all.
I have access to my dad's APAP machine. Sadly, it's a Philips Dreamstation. It's probably one of the recalled devices. He rarely used it in the past 2 years because he hated it lol. So I'm wondering if it'd be dangerous to use this recalled APAP and mess with the settings with the help of people online and using Oscar data... Worth a shot? Alternative is to pay almost $1000 for a new machine and still not helping me....

Thanks again. I assumed snoring was a surefire way of telling if someone has OSA.

[Dylanmatthew]

53 snoring events over 7 1/2 hours recording time really isn't all that horrible. Not quite 8 per hour average.
No desats to speak of above normal slight reductions when asleep.

Snores or lack of isn't really factored in when establishing criteria for a diagnosis of OSA.
People can snore horribly and not have OSA and there are people with severe OSA that don't snore at all.

Now snores can disturb a person's sleep though.

There's nothing stopping you from buying a cpap/apap machine and giving it a try and seeing if it helps your unwanted symptoms or not. You don't meet the criteria for OSA diagnosis. Doesn't mean you don't have some other sleep disordered breathing issue. Just means no clear cut OSA.
People do use cpap to reduce snores though. Insurance won't pay though and you have to go outside the medical system and do it yourself. People do it.

UARS is also a possibility but that is a really hard diagnosis to make unless someone has an in lab sleep study with a Pes device.

Another thing I would like to add that I forgot about before. My sinuses never ever feel fully clear. It's odd. I must be allergic to something because it wasn't always like this. But maybe my sinuses being blocked at night are causing this fatigue... The ent used an endoscope and struggled to get it up one nostril and couldn't get it up the other nostril. She said could be deviated septum and neither of us brought it up again. That endoscopy that lasted 5min cost me $137...

[Dylanmatthew]

53 snoring events over 7 1/2 hours recording time really isn't all that horrible. Not quite 8 per hour average.
No desats to speak of above normal slight reductions when asleep.

Snores or lack of isn't really factored in when establishing criteria for a diagnosis of OSA.
People can snore horribly and not have OSA and there are people with severe OSA that don't snore at all.

Now snores can disturb a person's sleep though.

There's nothing stopping you from buying a cpap/apap machine and giving it a try and seeing if it helps your unwanted symptoms or not. You don't meet the criteria for OSA diagnosis. Doesn't mean you don't have some other sleep disordered breathing issue. Just means no clear cut OSA.
People do use cpap to reduce snores though. Insurance won't pay though and you have to go outside the medical system and do it yourself. People do it.

UARS is also a possibility but that is a really hard diagnosis to make unless someone has an in lab sleep study with a Pes device.

Thank you for replying and clarifying it for me. Perhaps I have a vitamin deficiency, hypothyroidism or I actually am just really really depressed after all.
I have access to my dad's APAP machine. Sadly, it's a Philips Dreamstation. It's probably one of the recalled devices. He rarely used it in the past 2 years because he hated it lol. So I'm wondering if it'd be dangerous to use this recalled APAP and mess with the settings with the help of people online and using Oscar data... Worth a shot? Alternative is to pay almost $1000 for a new machine and still not helping me....

Thanks again. I assumed snoring was a surefire way of telling if someone has OSA.

Okay that's a good idea. I do go to sleep on my side but I am sure I end up on my back without knowing it... I looked up taping a tennis ball could help. I'll try that tonight

[Pugsy]

Whatever cpap/apap machine you might want to try you need to realize that the data it records may not give you clear cut answers to questions you might have
1...the AHI is going to be low so that data point will be useless
2...the data collected doesn't always point to clear cut answers...example while it might point to evidence of arousals or awakenings it doesn't/can't really for sure tell us if we are asleep or not and if we wake up it can't really tell us what woke us up.

So the data it does collect may or may not be all that conclusive for your situation. You will have to rely more on subjective feelings more than the data collected. We run into this all the time when people come here and complain of feeling like crap and the software reports show data that says they should feel great.
Sometimes we can blame medication side effects but not always. Sometimes people just have crappy sleep quality despite the OSA being well treated.

In short....machine data available may or may not help....but it is a starting point. Better than no data and as long as you understand the limitations certainly worth trying.

As for the DreamStation....is it the DSX500xxx? That is a good full data machine to experiment with.
From what I have read the bulk of potential problems was from off gassing which is usually done with after 24 to 48 hours of first use.
If your dad didn't ever use an ozone cleaning device which might accelerate the foam deterioration issues I wouldn't be afraid to use it for a short term experiment.

There are ways to get cpap/apap machines without it costing a grand. We have some forum members here who dabble in reselling either new or gently used machines. Depending on hours of use and model... anywhere between 300 and 500 bucks.

You would need a RX from someone to buy a machine online so the secondary private market would likely be your only option unless you have a friendly doctor that would write you a RX.

As for using your dad's machine short term...if it is the DSX500xxx...I wouldn't be afraid to use it for maybe a month or so to see if it helped or not. But that is me....some people went into full panic mode with the recall.

You can still register the machine and get in line for a replacement or repair. I would advise doing that if not already done.

As for nasal issues possibly being a contributing factor....most definitely because we simply don't sleep so great when we can't breathe so great. There are LOTS of things that can and will impact sleep quality which in turn will impact how we feel during the day. It's not always only OSA that is the problem. I wish it were that easy because OSA is easy to fix.
To fix any problem we first have to identify the problem....and sometimes it's the "identifying" the problem which is really hard to do.

I would most definitely have Vitamin D levels checked and testosterone as well.....just in case.
Lots of possible causes for fatigue and you really can't leave any stone unturned.

[Miss Emerita]

Absolutely give a try with the PR machine, and discuss your medication with your doctor. But I'm quite struck by your comment that you feel fatigue and malaise but not sleepiness or a desire to nap. This is somewhat suggestive of problems other than bad sleep.

Depression could certainly be one such problem. Pugsy has mentioned getting your testosterone checked. You say you have low vitamin D. Ask your doctor for help in understanding why that is and treating that condition. There's lots of excellent information at this trusted web site:

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/a ... deficiency

Other things to be screened for: thyroid function and autoimmune disease, maybe Lyme. By any wild chance is the timing such that you might have had COVID and now be experiencing long COVID?