Pop-up CA's followed by hypopnea

Not concerned about this as my sleep is good, but wondering if there are any thoughts on why I have started to get these "clusters" of CA's followed by a hypopnea or OA. I have been using CPAP for about 6 months for the most part with AHI < 1, but I have not had a cluster like this before. At the worst AHI still remains hovering around 1. I have not changed anything as I still have pressure set on my Resmed Airsense 10 Autoset at 8-18 and continue to use an F20 mask. As we enter fall my seasonal allergies are starting to kick up, which I guess could be the root cause, but I wanted to get the opinion of those much better versed in CPAP than I.

Doesn't look like you were asleep when any of those events were flagged so they aren't real.
Awake/arousal breathing irregularities getting flagged by mistake. False positives if you want to think of them like that.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 06, 2021 8:35 am

Doesn't look like you were asleep when any of those events were flagged so they aren't real.
Awake/arousal breathing irregularities getting flagged by mistake. False positives if you want to think of them like that.

Pugsy, thanks very much for the quick response. I've attached a graph from my Fitbit and the times of being "awake" are closely aligned with the clusters exactly as you suggested. I hope I am not misinterpreting your statements, if so please correct me.

Thanks once again!

We may or may not remember an arousal or awakening but they happen.
These machines only measure air flow....they can't measure sleep status at all.
Awake breathing is very irregular compared to asleep breathing. Sometimes these irregularities get flagged by mistake.
About all we can do about the false flags is ignore them or if we are seeing a high number of them we wonder what is causing the multiple wake ups and try to fix the poor sleep cause.

Central apneas are a common false positive but we can have them in the OA and hyponea categories as well.
I see them all the time and normally about 75% of my AHI will be false positives.

So....we ignore them for the most part like the 2 times on your report.
Now if you see lots of those clusters or you consistently remember lots of wake ups then we wonder about what is causing the wake ups/arousals and try to fix the cause of the poor sleep.

It is normal to wake up after a REM sleep stage cycle has completed. Normally we won't remember it because we aren't awake long enough to form a memory of the awakening but they still happen.
With the timing of those clusters on your report my first suspect would be REM stage sleep cycle ending.
Google "sleep stages" and look at the normal sleep stages on the hypnograms. You will see what I mean.

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 06, 2021 8:35 am

Doesn't look like you were asleep when any of those events were flagged so they aren't real.
Awake/arousal breathing irregularities getting flagged by mistake. False positives if you want to think of them like that.

Hi Pugsy, was your deduction of the poster’s awakened state purely by the irregular flow patterns adjacent to the noted events?

DLB wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 06, 2021 12:01 pm

Pugsy wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 06, 2021 8:35 am

Doesn't look like you were asleep when any of those events were flagged so they aren't real.
Awake/arousal breathing irregularities getting flagged by mistake. False positives if you want to think of them like that.

Hi Pugsy, was your deduction of the poster’s awakened state purely by the irregular flow patterns adjacent to the noted events?

Yes.

Awake breathing looks totally different from asleep breathing.