declining pressure

Hi all,

This is my first post. I have been using a Resmed Airsense 10 for about six months, mostly with good success. The problem I am having is that it seems that the pressure declines in the middle of the night, and I have to work too hard to inhale. When I first go to bed everything works well, and the air pressure through the mask easily fills my lungs. Then I wake up a few hours later (usually to go to the bathroom), and when I re-attach the hose I find it hard to get enough air. I feel like I'm working at inhaling, and this is not conducive to sleep so I take the mask off and go back to sleep without it.

I know that in the middle of the night I'm not my most rational, so it seems that this lack of air may be an illusion on my part. I have a few questions. Is there any good way of testing whether the machine is maintaining a constant pressure through the night? Would the card have data that addresses this? Is this a problem that other people have had? When I first got a cpap, same model, it had this problem and I got another machine to replace it, and the problem seemed to go away until returning again recently.

Thanks,
John

jbgilm wrote:Hi all,

This is my first post. I have been using a Resmed Airsense 10 for about six months, mostly with good success. The problem I am having is that it seems that the pressure declines in the middle of the night, and I have to work too hard to inhale. When I first go to bed everything works well, and the air pressure through the mask easily fills my lungs. Then I wake up a few hours later (usually to go to the bathroom), and when I re-attach the hose I find it hard to get enough air. I feel like I'm working at inhaling, and this is not conducive to sleep so I take the mask off and go back to sleep without it.

I know that in the middle of the night I'm not my most rational, so it seems that this lack of air may be an illusion on my part. I have a few questions. Is there any good way of testing whether the machine is maintaining a constant pressure through the night? Would the card have data that addresses this? Is this a problem that other people have had? When I first got a cpap, same model, it had this problem and I got another machine to replace it, and the problem seemed to go away until returning again recently.

Thanks,
John

Hi John,
We need to know which Airsense 10 you are using (CPAP, Elite, or Autoset). If it is an Elite or Autoset yes you can see the pressure graphs by reading your SD card with Sleepyhead. Here is a link to help you learn about Sleepyhead. https://sleep.tnet.com/resources/sleepyhead
What are your settings now? There may be settings that can be adjusted to help you get better sleep.

John, from your description, the solution could be as simple as increasing the minimum pressure on your machine. If it is set with a low minimum pressure of 4 to 6 cm, then what you're describing would be common for many of us. A higher minimum pressure can help to prevent more AHI events, and you need to increase it at least to the point where you are comfortable.

Let us know what machine you have, and we can direct you towards how to access pressure settings.

It is an Airsense 10 Autoset, so I should be able to access the data on the card. But when I downloaded the software and tried to launch it, it crashed my computer (a macbook air).

I believe that the pressure is set for 10, so it is not low pressure.

Is anyone aware of a machine not maintaining pressure through the night?

Are you sure it's not just a matter of being aware of air blowing at you when you first go to bed, and then not hearing much later on when you take off the mask? That's normal... but I do think you probably have another problem but I'm not familiar with the machine enough to comment as others will.

jbgilm wrote:It is an Airsense 10 Autoset, so I should be able to access the data on the card. But when I downloaded the software and tried to launch it, it crashed my computer (a macbook air).

Did it say anything that might indicate the problem? Did you try both Open and BrokenGL? If you only tried one go back and try the other. I don't use a Mac so that's the only Idea I had.

As far as losing pressure during the night I haven't heard anyone complain of it. It's probably not impossible but I think unlikely. It's best to take a look at the data.

You said your pressure is 10 so is that the minimum or maximum pressure and are you using ramp? Here is a copy of the clinical guide so you can get into the clinical settings and check or change your pressures if you want. https://sleep.tnet.com/home/files/resme ... -guide.pdf

Sleeprider wrote:John, from your description, the solution could be as simple as increasing the minimum pressure on your machine. If it is set with a low minimum pressure of 4 to 6 cm,

or, turn off the ramp if it's in use.

jbgilm wrote:It is an Airsense 10 Autoset, so I should be able to access the data on the card. But when I downloaded the software and tried to launch it, it crashed my computer (a macbook air).

I believe that the pressure is set for 10, so it is not low pressure.

Is anyone aware of a machine not maintaining pressure through the night?

while that is possible, in theory, modern machines, being computer controlled, tend to either work fine, or fail completely and put up an error message telling you to take them in for service.

jbgilm wrote:It is an Airsense 10 Autoset, so I should be able to access the data on the card. But when I downloaded the software and tried to launch it, it crashed my computer (a macbook air).

I believe that the pressure is set for 10, so it is not low pressure.

Is anyone aware of a machine not maintaining pressure through the night?

For starters, how about letting us know what your settings are:

Mode, min APAP, Max APAP, Ramp and EPR are the most important. If you don't know how to access the clinical menu, use this link: http://www.apneaboard.com/resmed-airsen ... setup-info

Sleepyhead is compatible with Mac machines, but I'm not a user of that platform. Maybe Palerider has a suggestion.

Sleeprider wrote:Sleepyhead is compatible with Mac machines, but I'm not a user of that platform. Maybe Palerider has a suggestion.

neither am I... other than to point out that Sleepyhead is *written* on a mac, and then ported over to linux and windows. so mac is it's native platform.

some more details about how "it crashed" would be necessary for mac people to help.