pressure

I have used my cpap since Feb 2010. I had problems with the sleep study center when my study was done. There were no private bathrooms at the center and I was embarrassed to walk to the bathroom in my nightgown in front of a man watching tv. I didn't like it at all. I thought I would be done with them, but now in November they are calling and harassing me to come back for a follow up appointment or else the Dr (whom I have never met) will not sign off on any supplies I get for insurance purposes. My husband has been on a bipap for over two years and has never been disrespected by his Dr. in state in which or home is. We are only here temporarily due to his work. I am paying for my masks and supplies myself but I feel like the pressure of the machine is too much at 14 cmH20. I want to change this. Can someone please let me know how I might do this?

Wow, this is the first time I have told anyone this story. Thanks for allowing me to vent.

Remstar Plus System One C-flex

That place sounds like a money mill. I see no need for a sleep study to Rx mask n' supplies. Any doc can't write the script. Ask your family doc or his doc to help.

I'm using full face mask with pressure of 8 and it seems like not enough. I'm waking up in the morning tired and have chest pains
on my left side. I did the sleep study with a nose mask and maybe they prescribed the 8 for that. Am I dangerously not getting
enough air?

face mask pressure wrote:I'm using full face mask with pressure of 8 and it seems like not enough. I'm waking up in the morning tired and have chest pains
on my left side. I did the sleep study with a nose mask and maybe they prescribed the 8 for that. Am I dangerously not getting
enough air?

Hi,

If you are having chest pains, you should either call your doctor, go to your clinic, go to the ER, or call 911. If you think that something is wrong with your therapy that might be dangerous, then you want to call your RT or sleep clinic right away.

Given that, and knowing that I am not in the medical field and really have no clue, a pressure of 8 should deliver you enough air. That is assuming that your machine is working right, your filter is clean, your hose is not collapsed, and everything is connected right.

How long have you been on CPAP? It is pretty normal to have an adjustment period. Some people even feel worse for a while after starting because of all the adapting and the fact that they are working a little harder to breathe. It is not uncommon to feel sore after sleeping with a CPAP for a few weeks because, with CPAP, you are probably sleeping more deeply and staying in bed rather than getting up and doing stuff like going to the bathroom. As a result of being in bed longer, you may be waking up a little stiff. Those things will probably pass with time.

If you are still sleepy after using the machine for 2 or 3 weeks, then it is possible that you need some adjustments, and that might mean a follow-up sleep study. The more advanced machines collect data while you sleep, and your doctor might be able to use that data to suggest tweaks to your treatment. Sometimes small tweaks can make a big difference. Other times, your sleep environment at home is so different from the sleep lab that the prescription ends up being out in left field.

Chest pains can be caused by swallowing air while you sleep. Look up the term aerophagia in the forum wiki. That might explain things better than I could since that is the single one CPAP problem that I have not yet had.

-john-

ggnorgan wrote:I am paying for my masks and supplies myself but I feel like the pressure of the machine is too much at 14 cmH20. I want to change this. Can someone please let me know how I might do this?
Wow, this is the first time I have told anyone this story. Thanks for allowing me to vent.
Remstar Plus System One C-flex

BTW, I think you Dr. is playing a game with you to make you keep coming back to get your supplies paid for ,etc. You don't need a sleep Dr. to do it - any Dr. can write a script that is OK with insurance.

Well, I think it's the same for all System One machines to access the clinician's menu. You press the main knob in (set to "setting") while simultaneously pressing the ramp button. Hold them both down for a few seconds until you hear a beep and you will be in a "provider" mode where there will be many setting options. From here I believe you can alter the pressure by scrolling to it, pushing the knob in to select it, turning the knob to select another pressure, and then pressing the knob in to keep that pressure. When you are done, select "exit" all the way out of the menus on the screen.

If you had a data capable machine you might know if you are doing better apnea-wise. Right now you may be able to select the different pressure, but you have no way of telling if the old or new settings are getting you better results. Remember that if you tolerate it better it does not mean that it is lowering your apnea. If you had access to a pulse oximeter it might give you an indication of your therapy effectiveness - but right now with the "Remstar Plus" you are shooting in the dark. Good luck.

Doesn't the pressure have to be higher for full face mask than nose mask? I just have noticed feeling
faint and lightheaded and having chest pains after using the full face mask. It doesn't seem to force
you to breathe deeply on 8.0

yeah a lot of these doctors are money mills. I know of someone who went to this supposedly well known and
great doctor who didn't diagnose their sleep apnea for months and kept on denying that anything was wrong.
She even refused to send them to a specialist for months all the while misdiagnosing the person

The problem is that 8.0 may not be enough to clear out the CO2 from the exhaled air. I may have almost suffocated from using the face mask.

Thanks to all of you for your posts. I don't feel confused and desperate anymore. I am going to learn to check the data. Will I need a card reader and software? I feel like I have regained control of my treatment.

ggnorgan wrote:Thanks to all of you for your posts. I don't feel confused and desperate anymore. I am going to learn to check the data. Will I need a card reader and software? I feel like I have regained control of my treatment.

Hi,

I believe that your machine has a SD card, which can be read by just about any computer. If you don't have a SD slot on your machine, you can get a USB card reader for between $10 and $30. There are 2 different programs to read the data, Encore Viewer and Encore Pro. Viewer would likely do the trick for you. It is available at cpap.com for $99.

Another gizmo to put on your christmas list is a recording oximeter. This will let you collect your blood oxygen levels while you sleep. That data can tell you if you are having any desaturations. If you are having them, you want to know about it so you can get them treated, too. The CMS-50E is the one I have, and it works pretty well given that they are in the $100 to $200 range.

-john-

CPAP full face pressure wrote:Doesn't the pressure have to be higher for full face mask than nose mask? I just have noticed feeling
faint and lightheaded and having chest pains after using the full face mask. It doesn't seem to force
you to breathe deeply on 8.0

What machine are you using? Some of the ResMeds (at least the S9 family) have a mask setting that needs to be set correctly to insure that the prescribed pressure is delivered for different style masks. The S9's also have a hose setting that needs to be set correctly to insure that the prescribed pressure is delivered for different types of hoses.

And "forcing you to breath deeply" is not the real point of CPAP. The point of the titration study is to find the minimum pressure that splints your airway open enough to prevent apneas and hypopneas from occurring. While many CPAPers do note that they feel they're breathing more deeply than they were before the start of theraphy, there are also a few of us who complain the pressure is forcing too much air down into our lungs to be comfortable.

ggnorgan wrote:Thanks to all of you for your posts. I don't feel confused and desperate anymore. I am going to learn to check the data. Will I need a card reader and software? I feel like I have regained control of my treatment.

gg, If you have a PR Plus you can't get any useful therapy data, just compliance data(hours used) which is for insurance purposes.