settling

[steve7e]

Hi,
I use a Resmed Spirit. Could somebody please explain to me what Settling means? What it does? And the difference between Settling and Ramp?
Thanks,
Steve

[Guest]

The settling feature allows the machine to disregard (and therefore, not respond to) any events that occur while you are awake. It should be set to the amount of time it normally takes you to fall asleep so that anything that occurs during wakefulness is not recorded and pressure is not altered.


The ramp feature allows you to start off at a lower pressure (if you need it) and then gradually builds up to your set pressure.

[Bookbear]

For what its worth, I've noticed that with a shorter settling time I get more hypopneas. Increasing the settling time seems to reduce those. In my case, I seem to have shallow breathing episodes immediately after I fall asleep, with settling on, these are ignored until the settling time has expired.

[Snoredog]

as mentioned it is a delay-to-therapy setting. It allows you to reach a deeper stage of sleep before treatment actually begins.

I have also seen the same thing as Bookbear when using the Settling feature, if set for 30-minutes or more HI scoring seems to go down.

If you snore, have a flow limitation or apnea the machine will ignore those events staying at your Minimum set pressure until the Settling timer expires.

[Goofproof]

[quote If you snore, have a flow limitation or apnea the machine will ignore those events staying at your Minimum set pressure until the Settling timer expires.[/quote]

Which means it won't be counted or treated, I want my machine to stop events, as many as it can. That's the idea of doing the treatment, to put it into work as soon as possiable, not to limit it's ability to treat me.

No Ramps, no time-outs, just keep me breathing. Jim

[kteague]

The purpose of Settling and Ramp has been well explained. Just want to say directly:

Settling is the term used when in apap mode.
Ramp is the term used when in cpap mode.

Theoretically, it is easier to fall asleep at a lower pressure. Since I'm an instantaneous sleeper and like goofproof want my therapy to begin as soon as I'm asleep, 5 minutes is my ramp or settling time. When I'm a little more experienced at all this, I'll test some longer times and watch my HI number. It may not be an issue for me since I plummet almost directly into deep sleep, but I'd like my numbers to tell a true story, so I'm curious.

Kathy

[GoofyUT]

Well said kathy. That's EXACTLY right.

Chuck

[Goofproof]

If you set the Settling time for 30 minutes, and fall asleep in 10 minute, that means, what happens to your body in that 20 minutes won't be counted, and also, it won't be treated.

When your settling period is over, the machine, can try to play catch up. Jim

[Guest]

That's right, Goofproof. So it's a good idea to set the settling time to however long it takes you personally to fall asleep. Everyone is different. You don't want the machine assessing responding and recording you while you are awake. That would screw up your baseline. Otherwise you'd want to be wearing the thing 24/7.

[jacko]

So if ya wake in the night and just lay there till ya go back to sleep dose that mean the info is incorrect , or ya wake up and just lay there for a fair while before ya actually take the mask off and get up the info is useless.
I have been wondering about this for sometime ,how accurate my info is.
Being a dairy farmer I am use to waking early but just laying there half asleep for quite a while .
Regards Jacko ( worn out dairy farmer)

[kteague]

Jacko - I'm waiting for someone to speak to your concerns about how your awake time affects your numbers. I've wondered about that also.
Kathy

[Goofproof]

If your awake, your probably breathing, not very likely to have a event while awake, so I see no events until I'm asleep, and with my Remstar APAP that has no settling buttons. It just expects you to sleep.

The first part of the night, I have no early OA or H's, unless I try to watch TV on my back, then Snores will be high if I fall asleep, and the machine will try to correct them. We all know that going to bed time, shouldn't include TV and your back is the worst position for Apnea, So i usually go to sleep in 5 to 10 minutes, unless it's going to be one of those nights.

Jim

[-SWS]

... and with my Remstar APAP that has no settling buttons. It just expects you to sleep.

As if APAP life wasn't cryptic enough... Your Remstar employs a settling time within the algorithm. No user buttons as you said.

[GoofyUT]

For Kathy and Jacko-

As I understand it, with a ResMed with Settling enabled or not, if you awaken in the middle of the night but leave the mask on, the ResMed will score what it detects in your wakeful, perhaps non-autonomic breathing, and may score these as events, hypopneas in particular. It'll also adjust pressure in response to scoring these wakeful events artifactually. Your overall "numbers" will be skewed as a result.

However, with Settling enabled and you awaken in the middle of the night and take the mask off thereby stoping the machine, when you put the mask back on and restart the blower, the machine will re-invoke a settling period during which it neither scores nor adjusts pressures , in order to allow you to "settle" back to sleep. Therefore, you won't be disturbed by increased pressures and your numbers for the session won't be skewed by artifacts.

Without Settling enabled, the AutoSet would begin to score events as soon as it turned back on, even if you lay there awake for awhile as you returned to sleep and autonomic breathing.

Hope this helps.

Chuck

[Guest]

it means:
Settling Timer:

Sets the time period the unit waits (at Min Press) before beginning to adjust
pressure according to the AutoSet algorithm.

Max Settling:

Limits the settling times the patient may select.