https://sleephq.com/public/453b021e-998 ... 4b1c33e52b
About half a year ago I finally decided to give my BIPAP another try after two years of not using it, and this time stuck with it until I finally got to sleep with it. As it stands now, I don't get to see a sleep doctor until April of next year. Naturally, I'm wanting to take matters into my own hands.
When I looked at the clinical settings, it was set at Max IPAP 11, Min EPAP 4, PS 3. I remember I had lowered the settings from what was recommended from my sleep study do to having trouble falling asleep at that pressure.
When I was able to fall asleep, I went back through my doctor's notes and found what they had recommended after my sleep study. Here's what it said:
"treatment auto-BIPAP at min EPAP 5, max IPAP 15, PS 8 cm of water is recommended." I tried this setting, and I got horrible aerophagia, comically bad. I then reduced the settings to IPAP 12, EPAP 4, PS 4, which seemed to help improve my sleep quality, but a moderate amount of aerophagia remained. Honestly the details of when I changed the settings and what I changed exactly where elude me, I may have tried other changes, but this is what I remember.
I tweaked some of the other settings to my liking, for instance increasing the TI max to the maximum value because it was annoying me that it was cutting off my full breaths when I was trying to get to sleep. I set TI min to 0.3s. I set trigger to very high and cycle to high, thinking (probably foolishly) that there could be no downside to having a sensitive transition between IPAP and EPAP.
So I've been having mild aerophagia symptoms such as occasional gas while falling asleep and waking up feeling bloated for probably a few months now, until last night I decided to try changing the PS down to 3.6. This might have eliminated the aerophagia entirely (I'm not completely certain; my tummy did feel weird at two points but I can't be sure it was aerophagia.)
I seem to need about 10 or 11 hours of sleep per night to feel rested, and I'm wondering how changing other settings could affect my aerophagia and sleep quality. I imagine the response will be "your AHI is good enough, just deal with the excess sleep," but in case there is a way to reduce the number of hours I sleep, I'm making this post.
I'm also considering changing Trigger and Cycle back to the medium ranges, as apparently that's the default and I'm not sure if putting them in the high ranges is having a positive or negative effect. I mean, the device seems comfortable with the settings it's at. What do you think?
I also realize that I tend to take the mask off around 4-5 hours into the night, as I sometimes wake up halfway through and get irritated with it, maybe because of the aerophagia? I'm not entirely sure why, but it's not good.
Any help is greatly appreciated, have a good day
