Can I adjust my own pressures?

[Grandma Lynn]

I am having a very rough time with all of this. I can't keep FFM or nasal pillows or hybrid from leaking. I start out OK, but as soon as I start dreaming, it wakes me up with leaking. Pressures have jumped to anywhere btween 13 and 18 . I start at 11 (feel like I can't breathe at all if it doesn't start out about there). If I could adjust it myself, I could experiment with gradually upping the pressure range each night. The techs say I am not allowed to access the settings! I have a Resmed s9.

[Guest]

It's YOUR therapy, isn't it?
It's YOU that is sleeping with this, right? (or at least TRYING to sleep with it)
Are YOU and YOUR insurance paying for all of this?

The "techs" aren't the ones sleeping with your machine, are they?

If the majority of those answers are "Yes", then it's OK for you to adjust your settings to be successful with your therapy.

.

[zoocrewphoto]

Most doctors and DMEs will tell you that you can't. But it is your machine and your therapy. Most of them have never tried sleeping with a cpap machine, so they have trouble understanding what it really takes to adjust. And if you have data available (you do), then you can make adjustments and see whether it helps or not.

Most machines have a clinician's menu that you just have to know how to access.

<http://www.apneaboard.com/adjust-cpap-p ... tup-manual>

If you go to this website, you can find your machine on their list. Then send them an email, and they will send you the file for your machine.

That will give you the full set of instructions for your machine, which includes changing any of the settings.

[TiredMominCanada]

I think that you will see that many people on this forum tweak their pressure a bit, myself included. My prescription - straight CPAP is 15. I'm new to this whole thing and can't cope with the full 15 pressure yet - so I'm working my way slowly up. I have a pretty great DME who showed my how to change it myself.

As long as you are healthy and don't do major pressure changes I personally don't see a problem with it. We don't usually sleep regularly at the sleep clinic so in my opinion the results they get from the titration might not be the ideal pressure at home. If you have the S9 Autoset then you should be able to download your data and use software to see how you are progressing. If you look up one of Pugsy's posts you can see a link to the software in her signature.

Now I'm in Canada and the rules are different here, once we get a prescription all they seem to care about is compliance and the doctor never sees your machine data so it's no big deal to change the pressure (at least in my limited experience). In the US, I don't know if there are consequences or not! You will have to see what people say.

[nanwilson]

There are no CPAP police in any country, not USA, not Canada, not Australia, ..etc...etc.....
DME's don't like you changing your pressure because they are loosing control...and its all about control.
Just up or lower your pressure a tad at a time, and keep it there for 5 days to a week to ensure you have given it a good test. A tad, is a wee bit, say .5 to 1 point .
Slowly is the key here, its okay to do, but don't jump large amounts at a time willy nilly, in case you cause further problems.
Good luck
Nan

[Xney]

As long as you're willing to look at your data nightly and get the necessary knowledge to understand what it means, you're going to have a lot better chance of success getting it right.

Doctors aren't using any different data than you, unless you're doing a sleep study. Sleep study titration is an important step, but only the first step!

Most doctors are more cool about it when you explain how you've been looking at the data and understand what it means. It's definitely not a good idea to tweak things without knowing what you're doing.

Also, for a lot of people, high pressures end up being sort of a compromise between factors such as leaks, apneas, central apneas, comfort, etc. So I think especially for higher pressures you have to be more involved as the patient.

[archangle]

Welcome.

Please fill in the equipment on your profile so we can help you. There's a link in my signature to help you do this.

In particular, we need to know which S9 machine you have. It should say something like Escape, Elite, or AutoSet next to the power button.

You can change your own settings. If you screw it up, you may make your therapy not work correctly. I screwed mine up and got really sick.