High leaks and steam trains in the night

Hello all, i'm a 77 year old male and I've been on CPAP for over ten years. Nine months ago I got the feeling that althought it had worked well during that time, I was starting to feel sleepier during the day, and it was time to replace my CPAP. I ended up buying a Resmed Airsense 11.

After nine months I haven't yet got the mask and/or settings right. I'm feeling more and more sleepy during the day, usually feeling sluggish after waking, and often falling asleep after lunch and dinner, for up to an hour.

I'm now on my fourth different mask with the Airsense 11 - I tried nasal, full face, then I went back to my original pillows P30i, then a week ago to a full face F40.

The P30i was the most comfortable but I was getting high leakage, typically getting 10/20 on MyAir but sometimes 0/20 (High Leak). I got a chin strap, which I used for several months, but found using it to be claustrophobic, and I still had a dry mouth. Also my wife complained of the noise of the leak ("steam trains going by").

A week ago I bought a full face F40. This I hoped would solve the leakage problem as it covered the mouth. The problems with it are 1. if I get up in the night, it blows max pressure when I put it back on, and if I move my chin even a fraction, I can hear huge leaks from round my mouth, and I can't get back to sleep, and 2. my wife still hears big leaks. Also my events/hour have shot up to 10.23. I'm not sure why I sometimes wake in the middle of the night - it's either an OA or a bad dream, I feel.

So the last two nights I've gone back to the P30i (without the chin strap). I feel like I've slept OK (but not well), with no leaks as far as I can tell. BUT there clearly are leaks as both my wife and MyAir can testify. However, my AHI is back down to 3.43. I didn't have to get up in the night either of the last two nights, which I feel makes a big difference to how sleepy I am the next day. Typically I sleep 11.30 pm to 6 am on a good night.

Any suggestions, please?
Graham

If I were you, at your age (and I'm even more by a bit) I'd check with my MD to be sure nothing else is going on - it's tempting to think everything's about Cpap, but sometimes it's good to check other possibilities.

Thanks Julie. Good point.

grahamau wrote: ↑

Wed Sep 04, 2024 5:29 am

Screen Shot 2024-09-03 F40 .png
Screen Shot 2024-09-04 P30i .png

This does not work.

Here is something easy. Get a free account at SleepHQ.com. Upload your SD card to SleepHQ. Post the URL in this thread.

Have you watched YouTube videos about fitting and adjusting your mask? They are available for every mask model..

Thanks so much for explaining that. I thought the attachments didn’t look right but I didn’t know what to do about them

grahamau wrote: ↑

Thu Sep 05, 2024 9:56 pm

Thanks so much for explaining that. I thought the attachments didn’t look right but I didn’t know what to do about them

Attachments seem to be a bit finicky.

What I do is post images over at imgur.com (you can create a free account) and I link to the image using the "BBCode share link" inside my post. It's not very hard for most people to figure out, but if you need some step by step instructions, let me know and I'll post them.