New to this...Question about data and leaks

Hello all,
I am very new to BiPAP therapy. My pressures are set at 15/11. I recently switched to a nasal pillow mask from the full face mask that was recommended after my study. I am getting conflicting information from my care team... The sleep tech that performed the study told me that my machine wouldn't register if I opened my mouth during sleep, but the RT who has been helping me with my mask fit issues said that a opening my mouth will register as a large leak and my AHI numbers will go up. I've been using the nasal pillows for 4 days and I feel pretty good, have not gotten up with a dry mouth or anything. I am really hopeful that this will be the answer to my problems, but I am concerned about the sleep tech telling me that I won't know about mouth leaks without having an observed study.... I am also new to the SleepyHead software and I cannot determine if I'm having problems or not. ANY advice is welcome.

Mouth breathing will indeed show up as a large leak if it is significant....it may or may not allow apnea events to happen...all depends on how bad the leak is.
A leak is a leak no matter where it comes from.

Your machine will flag large leaks if you have them...see the LL on the top of the events graph...that's large leak and if you have any the machine will flag it up there and they are easy to spot.

These machines can actually compensate for quite a bit of leak before they start running into trouble...you top leak line is total leak...mask vent rate plus any excess leak...is no where near large leak territory.

You are doing fine in terms of leak management.
Now if leaks are waking you up that's a different story because anything that wakes us up is unwanted but that's from a sleep quality standpoint and not large leak causing sub optimal therapy.

If you post images of your reports again...please review this thread for a more optimal format in the future.
viewtopic/t158560/How-to-post-images-for-review.html

Welcome to the forum.

Thank you!!!
I was suspicious that he was incorrect about the leak issue. It made no sense to me that the machine would flag a large mask leak, but not a mouth leak.

I'm not waking up with leaks either. I'm sleeping really, really well since switching to the nasal pillows. Right now my biggest issue is aerophagia, which I was hoping would improve once out of a FFM, but so far no luck there. I have a follow-up appointment next week and will discuss that with my nurse practitioner.

I will follow the format for posting photos. I haven't had a public photo account for about 10 years, so I was hoping the attachment was a workable shortcut. Lol. I will post it correctly in the future. ; )

Thanks again, I appreciate the advice.

I don't know if you are using BiFlex exhale relief or not but if you aren't using it...add it in to your settings and see if that helps with the aerophagia issues.
Did you know about BiFlex exhale relief?
If you don't know or it is turned off...go here and request the clinical manual for your machine and read up on it and how to get to it.
https://www.apneaboard.com/adjust-cpap- ... tup-manual

If that doesn't help you may need a slight change in your pressure settings...maybe even go to auto mode and use a lower setting part of the night and have the machine only go higher when absolutely needed.
Have you seen this?
wiki/index.php/Aerophagia

Oh my gosh, Pugsy, thank you! I wouldn't even have known to ask about those things.

I will investigate the exhale relief before I go to bed tonight!

accrn wrote: ↑

Sun Dec 16, 2018 8:18 pm

I will follow the format for posting photos. I haven't had a public photo account for about 10 years, so I was hoping the attachment was a workable shortcut. Lol. I will post it correctly in the future. ; )

Attachments are fine for posting your charts. Just format them as described in the link that Pugsy gave you. Makes it easier for the experts to help you out, as it shows them the data the need in a more readable view.