First night success story

[Atxtrr]

Hi-

I just used my S9 Autoset for the first time last night. Based on the stats I downloaded, it looks like I'm off to a good start. My study AHI was 36 recommended pressure of 8 and my stats were AHI of 1.2 and median pressure of 5.8. I had usage of 7.7 hours although it seems like I was awake a lot through the night thinking about the mask and wondering if it was working. The hardest part was fighting the urge to take it off and itch my nose or constantly adjusting it to a more comfortable position. The sensation of the mask digging into my skin is the hardest part of this - I dreamed that I woke up with a huge scar on my face

This morning I feel really alert and clear-headed although that could be my imagination!

A few system questions:
1. How do you set the time zone on the Resmed software? It's off by 2 hours
2. My auto-off doesnt seem to work. When i removed the mask it keeps pumping air. Maybe i just didn't wait long enough? I just hit the button to not disturb my wife
3. I feel a tightness in my chest- maybe a normal sensation of the pressure being forced into me?
4. The detailed report oddly? showed my only events as 5 Central Apneas with a rating of 10. Strange because I wasnt diagnosed with central just Obstructive. Could those be false positives? Not sure what the number 10 means.

Thanks for all the great info on this forum!

[Pugsy]

Welcome to the forum.

You don't set the time zone in the Resmed software. Instead there is a clock in the clinical setup menu that you need to set.

Smart start...the auto on/off feature of the S9 machines doesn't always works so great with the nasal pillow masks at the lower pressures. Are you using EPR? That reduces your pressure even further.
If your median pressure is 5.8...just probably not even pressure moving the air. I have read that the S9 Smart Start doesn't do well with some nasal pillow masks unless pressure is above 7 cm Not enough air movement for optimal sensing so the machine doesn't know you took the mask off. When that happens just reach over and manually turn it off. In fact that's what I do anyway. I don't wait for the machine to turn itself off...I do it myself. I do use the Smart Start for auto on though...but you may even have trouble with that part of it at times. Depends on the pressure and the forcefulness of your breathing.

Tightness in chest. Most likely from sore chest wall muscles. There is work involved exhaling against the pressure and it's new work for the body. Remember any new exercise can cause sore muscles until the muscles get accustomed to the extra "work". Hurts to inhale and exhale just a little. Sort of like costrochondriditis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Costochondritis
See a doctor if unusual or very painful or doesn't lessen or if you are simply concerned. We don't fool around with chest pain.

The detailed report oddly? showed my only events as 5 Central Apneas with a rating of 10. Strange because I wasnt diagnosed with central just Obstructive. Could those be false positives? Not sure what the number 10 means.

Yes, could be false positives because the machine doesn't know if you are asleep or not and it often flags awake breathing irregularities by mistake. Hold your breath for 10 seconds...that qualifies technically as a "central" but you did it on purpose. The machine has no way to know if you hold your breath on purpose and when we are awake or semi awake we easily pause our own breathing and never even realize it.
I don't know what you mean by "rating of 10"...unless you are referring to the events graph and the little box above each flagged event (in ResScan software)...then that would be duration in seconds of how long the event lasted. Needs to always be at least 10 seconds to earn a flag.
Waking often just fiddling with the mask or just because there is a new entity stuck on our face is actually normal.
The brain is not yet used to having the mask be attached. Waking often and central flags often go hand in hand and I wouldn't worry about it right now. As your brain gets used to having the alien being stuck on your face those wake ups will diminish.
Finally...some central events are normal happenings anyway. It's normal to have a few centrals during sleep stage transition especially at sleep onset. So a handful of centrals doesn't mean they are a problem and doesn't mean the diagnosis of central sleep apnea needs to be given. Need to have a lot of those centrals to start worrying or have big desats associated with them before we start worrying.

[Atxtrr]

Thanks Pugsy-

I now realize EPR was off by default- I'll turn that on for tonight. I suspect that was the reason for the chest tightness. I neglected to go into the clinical setup menu last night.

The 10 was the duration of the apnea like you say- it's that lollipop looking symbol on the graph. Probably just me getting used to things.

Thanks!
Tom