Sudden AHI change after not using for a week.

[bananas85]

Hi friends.

My AHI during the initial sleep test was around 7. So mild sleep apnea.

When I started using the machine my AHI would hover between 1 and 2. Almost never above 3.

I got COVID last week so i stopped using the machine as i was coughing a lot at night. It was also effecting my larynx from healing (the air flow).

Anyways I am back to normal, so i washed everything in my cpap and used it again the last two nights. The first night my AHI was around 4.5 and last night 3.5 . I believe something is off. The reason is I was still not asleep the first 45 minutes, and when I clicked on the sleep report it said 45 minutes of use AHI 4.5 . Doesnt make sense.. did i break soemthing while i was cleaning ?

[chunkyfrog]

Maybe not quite back to normal?
If this was only one night, you need to give it time.
Unless the machine was damaged in the wash.

[Tec5]

I was still not asleep the first 45 minutes, and when I clicked on the sleep report it said 45 minutes of use AHI 4.5

Evaluation or analysis of AHI is notoriously flawed if the raw data is taken while awake.
You should feel safe to discard events that are recorded during non-sleep.

Count only events observed while asleep.

I hope that you are on the mend from Covid

[Jlfinkels]

Give it time. I’m two weeks past covid and my AHI is 1.0 to 3.0, compared to my normal < 1.0. I have noticed it is slowly getting back to normal, so not concerned.

[ozij]

An easy case of Covid19 (the Omicron strain) left me with sleep problems for a while after the immediate respiratory symptoms went away.

[robysue1]

Anyways I am back to normal, so i washed everything in my cpap and used it again the last two nights. The first night my AHI was around 4.5 and last night 3.5 . I believe something is off. The reason is I was still not asleep the first 45 minutes, and when I clicked on the sleep report it said 45 minutes of use AHI 4.5 . Doesnt make sense.. did i break soemthing while i was cleaning ?

I want to make sure I understand what you are saying.

You put the mask on and tried to get to sleep for 45 minutes, but never fell asleep. Then you turned the machine off and looked at the sleep report for the 45 minute session you just had using the machine, and it said the AHI = 4.5. Is that correct?

If that's correct, then the AHI for the 45 minute session is meaningless---you were awake the whole time, but the machine does not know that.

As for why the reported AHI = 4.5: Wake breathing is significantly different from sleep breathing. In particular wake breathing is significantly less regular than sleep breathing. And there are all kinds of normal wake breathing patterns that a CPAP machine can mistake for sleep disordered breathing events. My guess is that during the 45 minutes you used the CPAP while you were awake, the machine flagged 3 or 4 places as "events" simply because those areas of your wake breathing pattern were a close enough match to the machine's programmed definitions of when to flag an H, a CA, or an OA. The machine doesn't know when you are awake and it flags everything in the flow rate that meets the programmed definitions of H, OA, and CA.

In terms of your actual therapy, those "events" mean nothing simply because you were awake when they happened.

In terms of the machine's data for the day this session happened? It means the data is dirty. If you used the machine during the rest of the night, you will need to mentally adjust the machine's AHI for the 24 hour period by discarding both the number of events that happened during that session and the 45 minutes of run time for that session.

[bananas85]

Anyways I am back to normal, so i washed everything in my cpap and used it again the last two nights. The first night my AHI was around 4.5 and last night 3.5 . I believe something is off. The reason is I was still not asleep the first 45 minutes, and when I clicked on the sleep report it said 45 minutes of use AHI 4.5 . Doesnt make sense.. did i break soemthing while i was cleaning ?

I want to make sure I understand what you are saying.

You put the mask on and tried to get to sleep for 45 minutes, but never fell asleep. Then you turned the machine off and looked at the sleep report for the 45 minute session you just had using the machine, and it said the AHI = 4.5. Is that correct?

If that's correct, then the AHI for the 45 minute session is meaningless---you were awake the whole time, but the machine does not know that.

As for why the reported AHI = 4.5: Wake breathing is significantly different from sleep breathing. In particular wake breathing is significantly less regular than sleep breathing. And there are all kinds of normal wake breathing patterns that a CPAP machine can mistake for sleep disordered breathing events. My guess is that during the 45 minutes you used the CPAP while you were awake, the machine flagged 3 or 4 places as "events" simply because those areas of your wake breathing pattern were a close enough match to the machine's programmed definitions of when to flag an H, a CA, or an OA. The machine doesn't know when you are awake and it flags everything in the flow rate that meets the programmed definitions of H, OA, and CA.

In terms of your actual therapy, those "events" mean nothing simply because you were awake when they happened.

In terms of the machine's data for the day this session happened? It means the data is dirty. If you used the machine during the rest of the night, you will need to mentally adjust the machine's AHI for the 24 hour period by discarding both the number of events that happened during that session and the 45 minutes of run time for that session.

HI thanks for taking the time to help.

Both things happened.

Yes the first 45 minutes I was "semi-awake." since i had not used the mask for a week, I was still not able to go to sleep with it. Maybe i dozed off but I cant be sure. Regardless at 45 minutes I took the mask off and looked at the sleep report. AHI 4.5
The same night (maskless now). I woke up to pee. On my way back to the bathroom, I was really sleepy so I decided to put the mask on again. (usually it goes better when I am really sleepy). So the rest of the 4 hours of sleep (approx) was with my CPAP on. This AHI was also > 4,

NExt night, I took a zyrtec to make me slightly drowsy and put the mask on and slept and kept it on for 4.5 hours. AHI from this night 3.5

I hope i clarified. Will pulling the data from oscar and comparing it to precovid help me trouble shoot.

The only thing I could have done was maybe clean the mast too aggressively. BUt I would think this would show up in "leaks" and all my leak emojis are green.

[LSAT]

Cleaning has nothing to do with it....I would bet that when you load your Oscar chart most of the events were CAs.

[bananas85]

Cleaning has nothing to do with it....I would bet that when you load your Oscar chart most of the events were CAs.

I just downloaded oscar. and opened . Yes they do read as CAs? why is this happening? Does it mean central apnea? or is it misreading something?

[chunkyfrog]

Give it a little time.
Healing has already been proven to be unpredictable.