DIY Home Sleep Study Tonight...

[Lizistired]

AVI, it takes about 20 seconds after I close my airway for my oximeter on my fingertip to register the desaturation. Period. For me it is a reasonable representation of what is happening inside my body for $100.

[Lizistired]

Lost my response to Burkebang, I hate when that happens, ...but I am too tired right now.... good night all

[2 B Sleeping Soundly]

Lizistired wrote: Lost my response to Burkebang, I hate when that happens, ...but I am too tired right now.... good night all

Liz, I have had that happen more than a few times since I have been here at the forum. Some of my post were surely Pulitzer Prize winning posts , but they get lost somehow during submitting them. I use a work around for this problem: Before submitting your post, using your keyboard hold down Ctrl and hit A (highlights the text) and then hold down Ctrl and hit C (copies the text to your clipboard). I now do this every time to keep from the frustration of lost posts. Now if the Submit gremlin steals away/looses your post you can just paste it into a new post by holding Ctrl and hitting V (pastes the text you copied).

I prefer using the keyboard to do this but it can be done with a mouse as well (click and hold left mouse button and then scroll through the text to highlight it, then release left mouse button. Then put the cursor somewhere on the highlighted text and click on the right mouse button. From the drop down menu select copy. If post gets lost go to a new post and right click mouse and select paste from the drop down menu).

John

[Jay Aitchsee]

Wow, Liz, what an experiment! You are a trooper! Congratulations for being such a great daughter.

I don’t when my PLM started. Long before I had a PSG. Maybe I always had it. I suspect my alcoholic past my have contributed.

I took the Cymbalta in a series of “try this” treatments from a sleep neurologists. In my opinion, it was prescription speed. It reduced my daytime fatigue, as noted, but also reduced the quality of my sleep. I had to take more ambien at night to counter the effects of the cymbalta from the day. I was certain this was not good for me and was putting too much stress on my body, so I stopped it after about four months. Then, coincidently, I had the upper GI where a small ulcer was found. I hadn’t any problems with ulcers in the past, nor have I had any problem since. The ulcer was cured with a 30 day run of previcid or one like it. Down deep in the literature for Cymbalta, it lists ulcers as a possible side effect and I’m convinced that’s what gave it to me.

Cymbalta belongs to that class of drugs which are advertised on TV and for which the Dr always has free samples. I’d be leery of any of those. There are some older tricyclic antidepressants like remeron which seem to promote sleep. Your dad my do just as well on it alone. You need to research them.

I’ve tried most of the common drugs for PLMD. Non have actually helped my sleep. Ropinerol seemed to calm the movements a little but my sleep did not improve, in fact it seemed more disturbed. Lately, I’ve been working with gabapentin and NSAIDs and have managed to get some deep sleep up in the 40-50 minute range - great for me. All the while, just kicking away. See my conversations with VVV.

There is some thinking that the movements themselves aren’t disturbing. Hard to see how they’d not be, but who knows. Anyway, I know they are very difficult to suppress. See Kteague’s posts.

Hope you find some of this useful and, again, kudos for being such a great person.

Jay

Edit: Oh, I wanted to mention about my addition of T4, D3, and B12 in reference to having your dad tested. These supplement have not provided a change in my sleep that I could measure, but I feel better - improved mood, less fatigue and that's a real plus.

[Burkebang]

I was not suggesting to only use the oximeter, but when using it togeather with a Zeo, I think you'll get the best screening possible, outside of a sleeplab

Sorry I disagree.

Oximeters are great. I am all for them. I just don't think that one should rely on a negative desat pulse ox report to say someone doesn't have sleep apnea. Not everyone will have significant desats measure by the pulse ox. It is is used and shows significant desats...by all means that is a pretty good idea that something is going on.

My only concern would be for those people with sleep apnea and they don't desat. A false negative of sorts. If someone is in denial and looking for an excuse to not investigate further then they could use the false negative of sorts as a way out.

Oximeters are a standard test in every sleep lab and gives some of the most valuable data in a sleepstudy. A desat of more than 3% is one of the main criteria for scoring an apnea. I think that anyone who's confident enough to try to screen another person will have the knowledge to give the oximetry data its proper considerations. I really don't think a person who is in denial and looking for an excuse to not investigate further or to not have a sleep study, will spend the money to get an oximeter. Also, nobody goes around pushing such home studies on people without VERY good cause. Such causes are most often observations of severe snoring, breathing pauses and gasping for air. That makes it highly probable that they will have desats to meassure.

The Zeo? Too many other things besides sleep apnea can disrupt sleep. Even if it is a perfect sleep stage indicator arousals don't always mean sleep apnea. When I turn over in bed and wake up due to pain...it has nothing to do with sleep apnea.

I totally agree. No matter what the reason, any arousal will be recorded for consideration. When compared to the oximetry data, a simultanious desat will be a very good indication of an apnea. On the other hand, a perfect sleep with no arousals and no desats, has a very high probability of properly ruling out sleep apnea, when the test is done over a considerable time.

Obviously a sleep study is the best thing to do. When someone refuses to do a sleep study and is fighting the diagnosis kicking and screaming...I would use the machine to prove the events are happening the best I could to get a confirmation of need and then perhaps proceed with the other items if they were available. Not everyone has the bucks to spend for the oximeter and the Zeo even if they were perfect indicators without limitations. I sure don't.

The problem is that you are giving the patient 5 aspirin before asking where it hurts... Any forced air down a persons throat will treat and reduce the number of breathing events, corrupting any data you gather. A person who is not used to sleeping with a mask on his face and a CPAP blowing air down his throat will NOT have a good night, the first night. This may prevent them from getting any deep sleep or REM sleep at all, what if they only have events in one of those sleep stages? You'll miss it completely.
Anyway, a study must be done while the person has a completely normal nights sleep, otherwise the results you gather, are not normal for the person.

I have read your other comments about your feelings that oxygen levels are primary concern. I can see where you might feel that way and that is certainly your right and privilege. While it suits your particular circumstances it doesn't suit everyone else's circumstances any more than mine does. There are way too many little "ifs" "ands" and "buts" with each person. Way too many exceptions to make conclusive blanket statements that will cover everyone.

Sure, there are a lot of ifs and buts with everybody. But CPAP machines are easy, they have only one single function, they prevent obstructions in a persons airways from choking them while they sleep. The way to meassure choking in ones sleep, to determine if a CPAP can help them, is with a flowmeter and/or oximeter. The CPAP records data using a flowmeter, but because of the pressure, the data gathered is corrupted and not good enough for diagnostic purposes. Any other ifs and buts is best left to the doctors to consider.
Btw. There is also oximeters which meassures airflow available:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Respiration ... 3cb7ec9767

Using the pulse ox and the Zeo could/does add additional information...I am not saying they don't...only that they aren't infallible and IMHO the cpap machine is number one in proving the existence of the events. Worry about how bad later once I have used the 2 X 4 to get the DeNial person's attention.

CPAP is number one in preventing events (thank god for that ). Nothing is infallible, not even a CPAP. Not everybody is in denial, that is important to remember. For those that are, the best 2X4 is the study that can show the most severe data. The study showing the most severe data will also be most likely to get a doctors attention. The study showing the most severe data will not be the one coming from a CPAP machine.
Any home study that cannot show data for at least a week, has very little credibility with me. When I went to my doc with my oximetry reports, I had data for allmost 50 days with me, there's no arguing with that... And he didn't.

There are many members here on this forum with a diagnosis of OSA and they had no significant oxygen level drops during their sleep studies performed in a sleep lab. The absence of desats does not mean there isn't a problem.

An oximeter meassures any desat, significant or not. If a number of insigificant O2 drops can be linked to arousals documented by a Zeo, you have a good chance of getting good enough documentation to prove to a doctor that further study is nessecary. But such borderline cases are really not good candidates for home studies.

The bottomline is that NOBODY should use such home studys to rule out anything if they are not 500% sure of the result they are getting, and repeating over a long time. The main reason for such studies is to document a problem that one allready know about in order to expedite getting a proper study done.

[HoseCrusher]

Avi, a significant desaturation involves both a drop on O2 and a spike in pulse rate. If the desaturation is a result of impaired blood flow to your finger, your heart will not respond.

I should add that some people can't utilize a finger pulse oximeter due to physical damage to the arm, wrist, hand, and/or fingers. Other monitoring sites include the ear lobes and the toes. Part of using a pulse oximeter is to make sure you are getting valid data.

[chunkyfrog]

Luckily for DH, looking at the short video I took of him on my cellphone
--of him snoring, not breathing, and then gasping for breath did the trick.
It took 10 months between diagnostic sleep study and getting his machine;
but he's a very stubborn guy, and I could only push so hard.
I hope I never need that much patience again!