Jerry, I'm not a doctor or anything in the health care field. ozij gave some very good links and good advice.Jerry69 wrote:My untreated AHI, from the sleep study was only 9.5.
I personally wouldn't consider 9.5 as an AHI to regard as "only", if you're thinking of it as mild enough to perhaps not need treatment. Having enough blockage to interfere with breathing on an average of almost ten times an hour is not a minor thing for the body to deal with - every night.
Just as important would be how much desatting is going on in your sleep if untreated...how low your O2 is dipping. Also important - how many disruptions to sleep are happening. If you looked at the actual numbers of arousals apart from the events that meet the official criteria for apneas and hypopneas, you might find that your sleep is being disturbed quite a bit more than "mild" would indicate.
As ozij pointed out, consulting with your doctor is important. The doctor might point out features in your sleep study that indicate a greater need for cpap treatment than a single number - the AHI alone - shows.
Regarding the snores you see on Encore data: I personally would not pay any attention to them if your wife is not noting snoring. I see a lot of snores reported on Encore when I use my REMstar auto/c-flex, but no snores reported on Silverlining when I use my 420E auto. Exact same pressure range set for both machines and both come up with the same low AHI for the night and use the same pressure for me throughout the night. I really do believe the "snores" index and snore tick marks are being reported erroneously in some way on the REMstar -- not really happening.
I get that discrepancy in the snore reports even if I turn C-Flex off to make the pressure setting completely match my 420E's settings. My guess is that your machine is eliminating snores, just as mine is, no matter what our "snores" index says with the REMstar.
You have your wife to doublecheck that for you. I have my 420E.
If you have the full reports from your sleep study and titration night, you might want to post them in the Sleep Studies forum of the ASAA board. sleepydave is great at making sense of the important aspects of a study and interpreting what really was going on in your sleep during your study nights.
It's been said before, but bears repeating...we can get so accustomed to the sub par way we feel over the years of untreated sleep apnea that we think that feeling is normal. "I'm a little tired, but hey, that's the way I always feel." It can take weeks or months of cpap treatment to feel better. It's also not unusual for some people to feel worse before they feel better. The disruptions while getting used to the equipment and getting a suitable mask can prevent feeling truly refreshed until we get fully accusomed to sleeping in this strange new way.
The main benefit (imho) to continuing this treatment even if your AHI landed you in the mild category is that whether you feel good effects or not, you have the assurance that you're preventing further damage. You've stopped at least that much chipping away -- damage night after night after night. "Mild" damage every night sure can add up over time.
Glad you got the software program going!
