Finally Getting Somewhere...

[motorgeek]

I just wanted to post about my experience last night. I finally got that really good sleep feeling last night. I don't know if it's the best I can get, but I'm definitely feeling great. RDI of 0.70 and a solid 7 hours of sleep. I'm hoping this will continue and will report back periodically. Please be advised that this is my personal journey, and my own decision to take control of my therapy. I advise you to work with your sleep doctor in regards to your therapy.

I was diagnosed with Mild Sleep Apnea and prescribed a pressure of 5.0cm. The first thing I noticed was that my nocturia drastically reduced (from 3-4 down to 1) so I knew that xPAP was a step in the right direction. However, I was still feeling tired and would wake up 3-4 hours into my sleep feeling very hot and wide awake. I would have problems falling back to sleep, and I just rip off the mask to sleep the rest of the night. My EDS was still an issue.

I discussed my issues with my sleep tech, and he switched me to APAP, but kept me at the 5.0cm minimum. He was reluctant to give me more minimum pressure. My biggest issue with 5.0cm was that it felt like I wasn't getting enough air, which was probably why I would wake up after my sleep cycle and have problems getting back to sleep.

I looked at my machine data and found that RERAs typically showed up around the times I would wake up fully awake. I wasn't sure if my RERAs caused me to wake up, or some other factor woke me up triggering the RERAs. I began to think that I wake up from RERAs before the algorithm on the machine gives me more pressure, so I decided to increase the minimum pressure slowly to see how I felt. I also watched for CAs that may occur from the increased pressure.

I'm happy to say that so far 8.0cm as the minimum seems to be working very well for me. I've read somewhere on this forum that for folks that have issues with RERAs/Hypopnea instead of OAs may benefit from a slightly higher pressure.

The point of this post is to illustrate my xPAP journey, and how I'm finding that therapy was not yet optimized. I don't know if it's optimized yet, but I sure hope it gets better.

I hope this post helps others out there in getting great therapy...I mean sleep.

[DoriC]

Good news, sounds like you're on the right track by increasing your minimum. Such a low pressure was probably disturbing your sleep. Keep us posted.

[Sir NoddinOff]

That's good news. Yes, in my experience a scattering of RERAs and hypopneas tend to show up during waking times or Stage One transition periods, mostly in/out of REM. That's pretty typical. Below is a normal person's sleep architecture... via the horizontal time line at the bottom, see if your events correspond with the shown REM stages and get back to us on that.

[motorgeek]

That's good news. Yes, in my experience a scattering of RERAs and hypopneas tend to show up during waking times or Stage One transition periods, mostly in/out of REM. That's pretty typical. Below is a normal person's sleep architecture... via the horizontal time line at the bottom, see if your events correspond with the shown REM stages and get back to us on that.

Yes, My RERAs and hypopneas align roughly with the REM stages.

Good news, sounds like you're on the right track by increasing your minimum. Such a low pressure was probably disturbing your sleep. Keep us posted.

Yes. I think the low pressure is giving me issues right as I transition from REM to Stage 1 sleep waking me up and doesn't let me get back to sleep because of my perceived lack of air with the low pressure. I don't think the low pressure affects my initial sleep because I've been keeping consistent sleep hygiene so by bedtime I'm already sleepy. However as I get 3-4 hours of sleep and transition out of REM, the low pressure starts to give me problems.