Another this is my first night post

[Willis]

Hello and thank you for this forum. I've read a lot in here the last couple of days. I feel like I'm a little behind on all this new information. First I'm a 55 year old male, very active, slim, eat well, great marriage, great grown up children, recently retired, Christian, never smoked and don't drink. I am very blessed and thankful for my life! People tell me I look as if I'm in great shape. Problem is I have been on high blood pressure medicine since mid 20's and have just not felt right in years. My wife has told me I've had sleep apnea for years with my shallow breathing. snoring and gasping for breath. I took a sleep test several years ago and was diagnosed with positional sleep apnea and told to sleep on my side. In retrospect I think that was a poor study.

I pushed to have another sleep study done on me this year and yes I have the sleep apnea and was give full mask therapy that night. I apologize for not knowing a lot of the information about the findings. I feel like I'm overwhelmed with all the new information and don't understand it. I had a total sleep time of 4.7 hours of a total of 7.3 hours in bed. I had one obstructive apnea and 20 obstructive hypopneas. The AHI index was 10.5. The 02 saturation levels were below 90% for 6.9% of the total time sleep, with the lowest 02 saturation level of 84%. My recommendations where CPAP at a pressure of 12.0 cm of h2o using Resmed large full face mask with heated humidifier. I don't understand most of that paragraph. I know I need this machine and in time I'll figure out as I go along. I'm committed to using this thing for life and I desperately want to feel better. I'm not sure I filled out me equipment information correctly.

I have two questions. 1. I have the Remstar Pro C- flex Auto IQ, with the System One Heated Humidifier by Phillips Respironics. ResMed Mirage Quattro with full head gear. Is this stuff a good brand? I have good insurance and could change to the ResMed S9 Autoset but the Respiratory Therapist said the one I got is a good brand and that people are happy with it. 2) I can't get the data from the unit like some of you guys can. I was told by the Res Therapist if I was good with computers (which I'm not) I could get some additional information but the therapist preset the setting and told me not to worry about it. I figured the setting flow is at 12 and I'll just keep learning as I go along. Sorry for the long post but I feel better explaining myself to people that have already walked the walk so to speak. Cheers to a good night sleep.

[archangle]

Whatchu talkin bout Willis?

Welcome to the board.

The AutoIQ turns into a manual CPAP after 30 days. I hate Respironics for doing this, but it is a good manual CPAP machine.

The S9 AutoSet is a better machine because it's an Auto and will do everything a manual CPAP will do. Change to it if you can.

Get the SleepyHead program and it's pretty easy to read your own data with either machine if you have a PC.

A nasal mask is usually better than a full face mask if you can avoid mouth breathing. You usually have 30 days to exchange one mask for another.

[Pugsy]

You have chosen the wrong equipment in your profile. Both your machine and your humidifier are in the drop menu selection under "PR....so and so machine"... PR System One Remstar Auto IQ CPAP and PR System One Heated Humidifier. Might want to change that to avoid confusion later.

SleepyHead is extremely easy to use even for novice computer users. Check my signature line for the line to the User Guide (read it first) and the link for downloading SleepyHead. There is no reason that you can't use SleepyHead to monitor your therapy.

I use a PR System One machine myself. They are excellent machines. My only complaint about the Auto IQ is the 30 day availability of the auto function. The full time Auto machine just costs the DME a handful of dollars more but at least they gave you a full data machine instead of a machine that told you nothing except how many hours you used it. Basically after the Auto function is used up (30 days) your machine reverts back to a straight CPAP machine and will deliver only a fixed pressure. Nothing wrong with that but sometimes people happen to need variable pressures...maybe from needing more pressure in REM or while sleeping on their backs. Having variable pressures available sometimes will let someone use a lower pressure for most of the night and the machine will increase to higher pressure only as needed. With straight fixed pressure you have to use the higher pressure all night or use a lower pressure and allow the events that needed a higher pressure to occur. Though not everyone needs auto pressure and not everyone does well on auto pressure. It is just nice to have the option there. Full time APAPs can be used in CPAP mode. CPAP machines have only one mode...

[Willis]

Thanks for the report on the machines and "Sleephead" link. I'll tackle that in a few days.

Got through the first night and accidentally pulled the hose from the machine two times. I woke up several times that I remember. Really bad headache where the face mask was pressing on the bridge of my nose. Made some adjustments then fine after that. My mouth gets really dry! Woke up two times with that and took a small sip of water which seemed to help. Wore some lip balm before going to bed and that seemed to help also with over dry lips. I guess I did pretty well with this machine as I feel like I won the wrestling match.

I feel really "Groggy" this morning. I'm hoping its just my body getting used to getting some real rest when I slept. I was in bed for eight hours...which is pretty long for me. Anyways, thanks for this support forum and I'll be reading more in here today.

[Pugsy]

The dry mouth is likely from mouth breathing. Increasing your humidifier setting may or may not help. All depends on how much mouth breathing you do. It is a common problem even with full face mask users.
There just isn't enough added moisture in the air to compensate for the drying effect from a lot of mouth breathing.

First few nights can be rocky. Takes a while to adjust to all this stuff and we often wake often during the night when first starting this therapy. Waking often (even with 8 hours of sleep) will make us feel rather crappy because frequent awakenings mess with the sleep cycles that we need to get good restorative sleep.
This should improve as you get used to having all this stuff attached to your face.

Things will get better though. You might look for some Biotene mouth wash or other Biotene products the next time you go to the store or Walmart. They make some special products that you can use to help with the dry mouth. Mouth breathing is common though and if you use a full face mask at least the therapy is not lost but the dry mouth will still occur. If you can figure out some way to keep your mouth closed...that will be the biggest help with the dry mouth.

[Willis]

Thanks Pugsy. I'll look for that Biotene at the store. During the sleep study they first tried the nose therapy but I just couldn't sleep with my mouth closed. They then put me on the full face therapy and that worked. This is very humbling for me as I usually "Keep my mouth shut." ha ha

I'll see how it goes tonight. Wonderful forum by the way and already very helpful to me. Good night sleep to all.

Oh Yeah...I figured if I live to be 90 years old...(hey, it could happen) I'm 55 now. 35 years from now?
If I stayed on that machine 7 hours a day and there are 365 days in a year.
I'll be on that machine a total of 2,555 hours in my life time.

Any math people out there? What else can you come up with? I'm sleep deprived and have never been good at math word problems.

[Pugsy]

Oh you will have A LOT more hours than that.

365 nights at 7 hours a night equals your 2,555...You forgot to multiply the 35 years...89,425 hours.

[Willis]

Oh crap! That does not sound good. I'm going back to taking one day at a time.