Periodic Limb Movements ?

[moonboots]

Hi everyone

Im new to the group and hope someone can help me with understanding my sleep study. I got diagnosed with sleep apnea at the start of the year, my symptoms were very bad headaches, tiredness and waking ever hour or so to go to toilet. I have had all the bladder tests etc and everything is normal. Since i started using my CPAP machine my headaches and tiredness are much improved. My problem is im still waking every hour or two to go to toilet, no problem going back to sleep. When i had my sleep study done the nurse mentioned my legs were kicking a lot during the night, the doctor hasn't mentioned this, what im wondering is could this be whats waking me at night. have attached 3 pieces of study as thats all it will let me upload, i hope the images are uploaded correctly so someone can look at it. Any input would be very much appreciated.

A fellow sufferer

[zonker]

firstly, welcome aboard!

secondly, i'm going to bump this up so that fellow forum member kteague will see it. i mean, i'm sure the post title will catch her eye. but i want to make sure.

kteague has this particular affliction and i'm sure she can give you all kinds of advice!

[moonboots]

Hi zonker, thanks for that

[ChicagoGranny]

what im wondering is could this be whats waking me at night.

That's a possibility. You should discuss PLMD with your doctor. In the meantime, you might want to read this - https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/d ... -in-adults and/or this - https://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/p ... disorder#1

[Grace~~~]

Do you ever wake up feeling like Gloria Estefan is in the room?


~~~kidding ...

The poster that Zonker mentioned, KTeague, took a video of her sleep and her Periodic Limb Movements.
The suffering is real but the video itself is awesome ... the rhythm will get you!

I'm guessing you don't currently have a video camera set up in your bedroom or you would have already discovered if you were being visited by Gloria in your sleep.

[kteague]

Hi and welcome. How is your sleep apnea treatment going? When one has both OSA and PLMD, one of the disorders needs to be effectively treated so you can know what remains of the other to be dealt with. Since limb movements have so many unknowns, in my opinion it's easier to be sure the OSA treatment is optimized, as that can be known through machine data.

About the limb movements on your report, I am a bit curious. Your report says you had movements during REM. While that can happen, I don't think it's the usual. And am I understanding it right that the study reports movements during wake time? This makes me wonder #1 what meds you are on and #2 if your PLMD diagnosis isn't fully reflective of what's going on. When I was augmenting on a dopamine agonist, one of my numerous sleep studies showed a few movements during REM and more periodic movements during wake than asleep.

Although seeing multiple different doctors never fully gave me the answers I sought, I still would recommend you get evaluated by a neurologist to ask them to explain these 2 facets of your report.

Have you already gone through getting your ferritin level checked, as well your magnesium and Vitamin D?

[moonboots]

Thanks for all the reply’s. My treatment is going ok, my headaches and tiredness have improved a lot but I’m still waking 5 or 6 times a night. I have been trying to video myself but had no luck so far as I’m having problems with the ir on the camera. I am on no medicine. I got bloods done yesterday not sure what they were testing for but will see if I can find what you mention kyeague. After reading some more information on the forum I increased my min pressure from 4 to 6 and leaving my max pressure at 12 and slept for 4 hours without waking up which is unbelievable , I haven’t slept that long for 10 years I’d say. My doctor a specialist is no good, he said waking ever hour or so is normal and if I lose weight I will make a full recovery. I have tried magnesium supplements with no luck but after last night I’m thinking my issues may have been a pressure issue. I’m still goomg to setup up a camera and I might up my min pressure a small bit more and see what happens. Hopefully that’s was my problem all along as plmd sounds worse than apnea.I must say after a day of reading the form I feel I have gone from having something that nobody could explain ( up every hour to the toilet)to something fairly common and something that I should be able to improve. Thanks again for the taking the time to reply. I have renewed hope of getting a night sleep.

[ChicagoGranny]

My treatment is going ok

We have to ask this, because some newbies show up here with wrong impressions. What was your AHI before you increased the pressure? What is your AHI after increasing the pressure? Are you using Sleepyhead software?

[moonboots]

My ahi is usually between 1 and 2 , I only changed pressure last night and it was 1.6 last night, I have the sleep head software , that was why I changed the pressure because the pressure was 6 and over most nights. I’m still trying to figure out how to understand the charts and info. I’m planning on leaving my min pressure at 6 for a week and see how it goes. Any thought or recommendations are welcome.

[ChicagoGranny]

I’m still trying to figure out how to understand the charts and info.

No need to try to do it on your own. Post a typical night's graph in this thread. See Pugsy's Instructions thread pinned near the top of the index page.

[moonboots]

Ok he we go, this is the last two nights, I’m not sure which charts I should up load so if something else is need please let me know. I notice my ahi is lower than what my machine has been saying, by 1.0 unit, I’m very interested to hear any input on it as I’m unsure how to read it or what to look for.

[Rob K]

I have apnea and limb movements also. I was waking up 6-10 times a night and still felt horrible even when using xpap. My ahi was around 3-5 and occasionally 6. The forum members helped get ahi down to around 1 by increasing the pressure a little. I wake maybe 2-4 times a night now and it made a huge difference. Not great sleep, but far better than what it was. Your on the right track by first using sleepy head and optimizing your therapy. I haven't thought much about the limb movements. Never video taped myself. Will follow along with what you are doing and maybe it will inspire me to look into things further.

By the way your graphs look really good. Not sure how you get things any better.

Forgot to mention that when we changed the pressure that I started feeling better that week. Over maybe a month or two I started to wake up less. It was gradual thing for me. Took some time for my body to adapt to the change. Now that you changed the pressure, give it a little time to see how things play out.

[moonboots]

Them symptoms sound very like mine except I feel better using the cpap , but I’m still waking loads , except last night when I upped the min pressure, I only woke a couple of times , at this stage I’d take that , hopefully it wasn’t a one off improved sleep.

[moonboots]

I plan on leaving the pressure the same for a week and see then. I can’t belive how many people here have the same symptoms as me here, my doctor had no idea why I was waking at night and another doctor said it was normal. It’s great not to be the only one with these symptoms.

[Rob K]

I just noticed some pretty high spikes in your leak rate graph. Mine very rarely go above 40. Are you getting some mask leaks that maybe are waking you up? Are you adjusting the mask when you wake and get a spike in leakage?

I see what's happening. There are breaks in your therapy at that time. Potty time. You must be taking the mask off before turning the machine off.