First Night - BLISS!

[Tn-Ken]

I just finished my first night on my equipment and got a terrific night's sleep considering everything and woke up feeling better than I have in a very long time.

I got the RemStar Auto with c-flex, the heated humidifier and the Comfortlite 2 mask.

Since I think I have a large schnoz I started out with the large pillows but after some fooling around with that I switched to the mediums. After fiddling with all of the adjustments I got it to the point where I had no leaks and it was fairly comfortable. The only thing I have is a slight tenderness at the bottom of my nose.

BUT - I wore the thing for the entire night and loved the sensation of actually breathing.

Thanks so much to all of you who led me in the direction of this equipment. I'm looking forward to taking a look at the data later on today to see what it found. For me, I'm just delighted at the prospect of a good night's sleep.

Also, kudos to my Doc who wrote a prescription for this without a sleep study. Both he and I agreed that in my case (since my wife was reporting earthquake snoring) a sleep study would have been redundant at the very least and would have provided a yacht payment or two for the study center.

[ThStoddart]

Tn-Ken -- I'm glad you're having such immediate success! It's a breath of fresh air (pun intended) compared to all the "3rd day, still fatigued" postings.

But I'm curious as to how your doctor determined the proper pressure setting without an overnight sleep study...I had always thought the split night sleep study served two purposes: (1) accurately diagnose or rule out the presence of OSA and (2) determine the correct pressure setting, i.e., not too high not too low.

But it seems like they got it right based on your experience last night!

[Claerwen]

My first night will be tonight. I am in the exact same situation - no second study, relying on the auto-titration to regulate pressure. So this will be my first experience with any kind of setup.

Despite my trepidation at wearing the gear and my gloomy resignation to a lifetime of being attached to this machine, I'm really looking forward to tonight.

I hope (please, please, please) that I have a similar outcome as you.

[rested gal]

I just finished my first night on my equipment and got a terrific night's sleep considering everything and woke up feeling better than I have in a very long time.

I got the RemStar Auto with c-flex, the heated humidifier and the Comfortlite 2 mask.

Excellent! So glad you got good results right off the bat. That's the way it was for me, too, luckily.

If a person is very convinced they have OSA and absolutely determined that CPAP is what they want to use, doing what you did (cutting to the chase, no sleep study) can work fine. That's what I did.

The downside to skipping a full PSG sleep study is this...

If a person has additional sleep disorders he/she doesn't even know about -- PLMD (periodic limb movement disorder) for example -- and IF the other disorder disrupts sleep to a significant degree, the person might figure, "Well, I'm going to quit CPAP. I tried it but it doesn't hep me. I still feel exhausted during the day."

They might need CPAP for their OSA AND treatment for the PLMD.

In you case, though, Ken, CPAP worked wonders for you immediately. That's great! Keep on keepin' on.

You might want to get a second mask for rotation. Something like the Activa or the Puritan Bennett DreamFit (not the DreamSeal for the Breeze.) Can help to have another type of mask to switch to when pressure points from any one mask get sore.

If you get an Activa, that will give you a short swivel connector hose (comes with the Activa) that's handy to use also with the ComfortLite 2. Adding that swivel connector hose between the elbow on top of the CL2 and the main air hose makes turning from side to side easier. Smoother swiveling.

[rested gal]

But I'm curious as to how your doctor determined the proper pressure setting without an overnight sleep study.

Ken's using an autopap machine...auto-titrating cpap machine... set for a range of pressures. When an autopap senses that the air flow is becoming restricted, the autopap adjusts the pressure up/down automatically to prevent apneas. Pretty nifty kind of machine.

[Tn-Ken]

But I'm curious as to how your doctor determined the proper pressure setting without an overnight sleep study

Well - it went like this. I snore badly (reported by my wife and indicated by the cracks in the walls). I used to wake up in the morning feeling dead tired (sounds like apnea to me!) I'd always want to take a nap (anytime!) so - must be I have apnea/snoring problems.

Why would I need a sleep study? Well - to determine if I have some sleep problems and figure out the right pressure. Hmmm... you say that there are machines out there that figure that out for me? - and the cost of the total machine is less than 30% of the sleep study so that even if I end up throwing the machine out after the first night I'm still WAY ahead of the game. (Yes, I pay my own medical bills for the first $5200 a year) And, with the proper software (Encore Pro plus MyEncore) it will tell me what the pressures should be so that I can self-adjust the machine?

So - first night - started out at a very low minimum (6) - the machine raised it during the night to 11 but the average was around 9. I had 440 seconds of apnea (seems like a very long time to me!) in 36 events during the night.

Tonight I'll start it out at 8 and see what happens. I figure within a week or so I'll have a great starting point and be sleeping like a baby.

All of this stuff about the sleep center being able to titrate the exact pressure is just so much baloney. That presumes so many things - that the patient is sleeping the way they normally would (right, sure!!!) - that the technician is competent and alert and that they are interested in making sure that they are doing their job in the very best way. And finally that the Doc is tuned in to the variables. It just isn't going to happen that way all of the time and then you're left with a CPAP set at a specific pressure that may or may not be good for most events for you.

Gosh - got carried away there didn't I?

In any case - I'll keep posting as I get more into this because it's these posts that gave me the courage to try what I did.

[Nitro Dan]

Welcome back to LIFE!!