Resmed S9 at altitude 8,500 - 11,500

[hastings]

Resmed S9/humidifier , Mirage Activa LT Set at 11cm, EPR 1, Ramp 10 minutes. Not using Autoset. I have resscan 3.11 (thanks).

I joined this board because I was extremely frustrated with the information I was getting from Resmed and my equipment provider. Your knowledge is amazing. My problem -- I will be traveling for 16 days in December. The first portion of my trip is at sea level, but I will be spending the last six days in Peru above 8,500 ft. The highest altitude is in Cusco, 11,500 ft. The Resmed S9 automatically compensates up to 8,500 ft. Is there a way to set the machine for the higher altitudes?
Thanks.

[who]

If you are treating garden-variety everyday OSA, your doctor and RT may want you to (1) use the machine in auto mode or (2) have you kick pressure up a cm or a cm and a half, or something, if sleeping up that high. Be careful, though. People without breathing problems can have trouble sleeping at high altitudes. Altitude sickness is nothing to yawn at.

You and your team may find this article useful for doing the math: http://chestjournal.chestpubs.org/conte ... l.pdf+html

[cpapernewbie]

Last year I travelled for 3 months overseas, among them for 10 days in a 10,000 ft mountaineous region in Sezhuan, China.

The first day I just leave my auto CPAP (at that time the Auto M series A-Flex) at the same auto setting.

Unfortunately it worked only for 1 night, the second night it decided to rest forever... I have to survive at the high altitude for the next 9 days without CPAP. It is good if a backup CPAP is available

[billbolton]

The Resmed S9 automatically compensates up to 8,500 ft. Is there a way to set the machine for the higher altitudes?

You may find this article in Resmed's Snooze Newz useful - Traveling with CPAP... all the way to the top.

Cheers,

Bill

[timbalionguy]

You might consider taking a simple manometer with you to check pressure, if a given pressure setting is critical for you, and this is a straightforward CPAP or APAP machine.

Hmmm..... did Kilimanjaro (19,060 feet, tallest mountain in the world not part of a range) with a CPAP machine. Maybe there is hope that I can someday one more time, camp for a few nights in lion country.....

[torontoCPAPguy]

Resmed S9/humidifier , Mirage Activa LT Set at 11cm, EPR 1, Ramp 10 minutes. Not using Autoset. I have resscan 3.11 (thanks).

I joined this board because I was extremely frustrated with the information I was getting from Resmed and my equipment provider. Your knowledge is amazing. My problem -- I will be traveling for 16 days in December. The first portion of my trip is at sea level, but I will be spending the last six days in Peru above 8,500 ft. The highest altitude is in Cusco, 11,500 ft. The Resmed S9 automatically compensates up to 8,500 ft. Is there a way to set the machine for the higher altitudes?
Thanks.

Yes. Of course. Leave the machine at 8,500 feet and use a longer hose.

[hastings]

Thanks for the articles. So there is hope that the machine will work. Maybe my supplier will call Resmed for the settings for the high altitude week and supply me with another SD card. Or maybe I'll know by travel time how to configure the SD card using Resscan.

[torontoCPAPguy]

I'm no technician for these products but I would think that the blower is going to have to work extra hard to put out the pressure as opposed to at sea level and that therefore the current draw and stress to the motor will be higher (hence the unit that quite; probably used plastic bearings). I would think that you want to talk to ResMed or the manufacturer directly to get their take on it as they are going to have the most experience. I would likely select a blower that has metal bearings in the motor as opposed to plastic as the increased speed will cause plastic bearings to heat up and seize. Just a guess you understand. Secondly, you will want to make sure that the unit can adjust to the higher altitude automatically or manually and you will want the instructions on how to do that and you will want an appropriate device to measure the pressure output; I am no physicist (I used to be) but I am thinking that 10cm H2O at sea level is not the same at 10cm H2O at 20,000 feet ASL but I could be wrong. Don't have the mind to think it through this AM. I'm just going to head to the range with my son and his buddies and let off some rounds. Hope I can find my hearing protectors.

Good luck and enjoy your trip.

Let us know what happens so that we have reference for future.

By the way, the same pressure inside your mask along with the reduced pressure OUTSIDE of your mask is likely to cause leaks I would think (anyone?) so you may want to think about that mask and how tight the seal is for when you are at 20K ASL. I know airliners max out at about 10K ASL effective and folks have mentioned no problems with mask seal but then again, what you don't know you may not realize it is an issue.

Last thing. water will boil at a much lower temperature at altitude. So if you are running a heated humidifer I wonder if that is going to have any effect on the amount of moisture that it evaporates into the air stream? I don't think you have to worry about boiling water but perhaps if you are going to use a humidifier there is a concern. Dunno.

Highest I have ever been is when a friend of mine and I took some acid when we were in high school but that was before CPAP.

[TheDuke]

Interestingly, I had the same failure experience with my Sullivan (Res-Med) BiPAP as described by one of the previous posters.
I was vacationing in high mountain area of Montana at a ski resort area. Though my machine had some age on it, it had been functioning quite well
My first night staying at about 10,000 ft. altitude I was awakened during the night by a rasping, grinding sound from my machine and then it died. I was 2000 miles from home in a remote region of Montana. But it ends well-My hometown DME arranged for me to get a machine from a sister DME about 40 miles distant and transmitted my prescription to the Montana DME. I was assured that my Sullivan ( About 6 or 7 years old) was not to be repaired, and Medicare and my supplemental ins. handled a replacement without complaint.

[timbalionguy]

Interestingly, I had the same failure experience with my Sullivan (Res-Med) BiPAP as described by one of the previous posters.
I was vacationing in high mountain area of Montana at a ski resort area. Though my machine had some age on it, it had been functioning quite well
My first night staying at about 10,000 ft. altitude I was awakened during the night by a rasping, grinding sound from my machine and then it died. I was 2000 miles from home in a remote region of Montana. But it ends well-My hometown DME arranged for me to get a machine from a sister DME about 40 miles distant and transmitted my prescription to the Montana DME. I was assured that my Sullivan ( About 6 or 7 years old) was not to be repaired, and Medicare and my supplemental ins. handled a replacement without complaint.

Its not impossible that this failure was altitude-related, but it sounds to me like this was some sort of mechanical failure in the motor/blower that just happened to happen at that time (I would have done a post-mortem on it to see exactly what failed).

As far as 10 cm pressure being different at 1,000 or 10,000 feet, it is not. This is a relative pressure, and what it means is that the pressure is 10 cm/H2O higher than the ambient absolute pressure. So differential pressure sensing should work fine. Where problem are likely to happen is when the absolute air pressure causes pressure sensors to operate near their mechanical limits. (Because of the low pressures involved in CPAP, I would not be at all surprised if they are using absolute air pressure sensors, as opposed to relative air pressure sensors in the machines.) Still, I will agree that the blower probably has to work harder at higher altitudes. Thinner air means the blower has to spin faster for a give pressure. But since the air is thinner, the load on the motor is not that much greater. It is load on a centrifugal blower that makes it use a lot of power, and not pressure. Thus, a blower raising to a moderately high pressure, but low volume will use less power than a blower raising a relatively low pressure but a lot of volume. (Learned this the hard way!)

[jdc562]

At 8000 feet, my Resmed S9 stopped supplying sufficient pressure during the middle of the night. I switched to my older Autoset II EPR that I was carrying as a backup, and it worked fine for the rest of the trip. The S9 still works ok at lower elevations.

[dtsm]

Rather than starting new tired, bumping this one.

Planning Cusco trip and appreciate any feedback re using either S8 or S9 autoset models at 12,000 ft?

Thanks