frequent awakenings

I have been trying APAP for about 6 weeks now. I am now able to fall asleep with the mask and my leakage and AHI stats look excellent when I sleep. Problem is that I wake up within 2 hours every night and then have trouble falling back asleep with the mask. My frequent awakenings were the reason why I went to see the sleep doctor in the first place. I was hoping that my moderate/severe apnea was the cause of this but could it be something else?

Could you tell us about your setup?......what is your pressure? If "fixed", do you use EPR?

Your awakenings may not be unusual in this stage of your therapy, but your settings may contribute to it, too.

Best wishes,

Den

I use APAP 6-12 range. I don't have C-flex or EPR, unfortunately. Mostly my stats indicate aroun 8 as 95% pressure range. I tried starting at 8 but notice that I fall asleep much more easily at 6.

After several months I still wake up after 1 to 2 hours not liking having the mask on. I'm guessing when I cycle back thru Stages 1 & 2 of sleep I become more aware of its presence. Not sure exactly why. I'll be watching your responses to see if something helps me.

If your equipment and settings all check out, it may just be that this thing stuck on your face feels foreign.

I do have PLMD also, but at two hours my medicine is still controlling the limb movements, so they are not the cause. A person with untreated PLMD or RLS will experience frequent awakenings. If you awaken in the morning and the bed is in wild disarray, you might want to get that checked out. If you wake up in the same place you went to sleep without moving, it's not your issue. An initial sleep study with no leg movements is not conclusive if the OSA arousals were frequent enough to keep the limb movements at bay.

Good luck with getting longer stretches of sleep.

Kathy

zzzaoem wrote:I use APAP 6-12 range. I don't have C-flex or EPR, unfortunately. Mostly my stats indicate aroun 8 as 95% pressure range. I tried starting at 8 but notice that I fall asleep much more easily at 6.

Here's my thoughts.....

You didn't indicate whether you were getting your stats from software or the LCD screen, but if it's showing your 95% at 8, I would set the machine in single pressure mode at 8......that way you can use EPR. Set your ramp feature at 6 for about the time it takes you to go to sleep. There's a feature called "settling" and you might want to set that time for approximately the same as the ramp. Set your EPR number for what feels comfortable for you to breathe.
This, I believe, will help to tell if the sleep disturbances are caused by pressure changes.
Try that for a week or two and watch your stats and see if you're waking up as frequently as before. As I said before, it's not unusual for a new user to experience what you have, but this may help you adjust to the therapy sooner. THEN....at some point, you can try going back to the APAP mode and see what happens.

Best wishes,

Den