My first sleep study was five weeks ago, showed severe apnea with AHI of 80. My oxygen sats showed a nadir of 72, with 89% of my sleep time spent with levels of less than 90%.  

    So tonight I get to go for a full night titration, and I really am hoping that I will be able to adjust to CPAP without too much trouble. I really want this to work, and am looking forward to feeling better. I know that it will probably take a few trials and errors,  but I am more than willing to do the work. I have a follow up appointment with my pulmonologist in two weeks, so I probably won't get my machine until after that,  but at least things are moving ahead!

    Many thanks to all who post here with such great information. I am far more prepared for tonight than I was for the original study.

   Wish me luck!



Last edited by jrinker on Thu Aug 20, 2009 11:33 am; edited 1 time in total

Good luck - I hope they can find the perfect thing to put your OSA under control! :)

Hope you are sleeping soundly right now.  I wonder if perhaps the more severe cases adapt quicker out of desperation.     Anyways good luck!

Well, I'm back from the study.  It was more difficult than I thought, but not terrible.  The tech gave me a comfortgel nasal mask, saying that the full face ones leak, at least at higher pressures.  So I went with the nasal mask, and it wasn't too bad. I'm still thinking I might want a full face mask, given that I have a lot of congestion sometimes.

At first, it was kind of claustrophobic, especially when the pressure was very low. It took me about thirty minutes to fall asleep, even with the ambien. I woke up later, thinking that the mask was leaking, but the tech came in and said it wasn't , that it was noisy because she had the pressure up fairly high. I fell asleep and woke up about 4am, and then just dozed off and on til about 5:45.

 At one point, I noticed that the pressures were different upon inhaling and exhaling. It seemed to be "pre-set" intervals, and I had a little difficulty keeping up with the machine's rhythym.  Later, I woke up and it seemed that now the machine was sensing when I was breathing in and would adjust accordingly. Can one of the more knowledgable posters give me some insight about this. Was that bi-pap? Auto-pap?  The tech wouldn't give me any info; she said she couldn't even tell me if I had slept! I know this is protocol, so I'm hoping that someone here can give me idea of what I was experiencing.

All in all, I think it is doable.  I see my pulmonolgist in two weeks and will find out all the details then. In the meantime, it's back to the waiting game.

Thanks, everyone

Congratulations on completing another step on the road to restful sleep! Don't you just HATE the waiting?


_________________
Some people are like Slinkies... Not really good for anything, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs.
Resmed VPAP Auto. Humidaire 3i, ProBasics Zzz-Mask full face, ResScan 3.7, S8 ResLink, Embla oximeter.

Yes, Crohnie, the waiting is making me crazy!  Now that I know there is a solution, I want to get started right away!

I so understand and remember that feeling! In my case I could have had my equipment 2 days after my titration IF I was willing to accept whatever the local DME decided to provide me with. I was NOT about to accept a CPAP that wasn't fully data capable so it took me something like 10 days to 2 weeks to get the fully data capable CPAP I wanted.


_________________
Some people are like Slinkies... Not really good for anything, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs.
Resmed VPAP Auto. Humidaire 3i, ProBasics Zzz-Mask full face, ResScan 3.7, S8 ResLink, Embla oximeter.

jrinker wrote:

At one point, I noticed that the pressures were different upon inhaling and exhaling. It seemed to be "pre-set" intervals, and I had a little difficulty keeping up with the machine's rhythym.  Later, I woke up and it seemed that now the machine was sensing when I was breathing in and would adjust accordingly. Can one of the more knowledgable posters give me some insight about this. Was that bi-pap? Auto-pap?  The tech wouldn't give me any info; she said she couldn't even tell me if I had slept! I know this is protocol, so I'm hoping that someone here can give me idea of what I was experiencing.

Thanks, everyone

I am no pro on this stuff,  but,  I noticed the same exact thing as you.  When I woke up, it was smooth breathing.  MUCH lower pressure than during the night.  HEAVEN!!!   I could change things by holding my breath (I tried it once after I woke up).  When I did that, the pressure suddenly shot up.  And the machine made a  whooshing sound along with a click when it did that.  I wonder if that was an auto Bipap?

Wouldn't that be kewl if we were both set up for auto bipaps?  It seems a shame to have to suffer from high pressure the whole night just for problems primarily in my REM sleep.  My REM AHI was 62.0, but during other times, it was 13.8.   One of the techs there told me that you can "flunk CPAP" for insurance purposes the same night of your titration.    In other words, you never have to take a CPAP home, and then flunk using it before getting a BIPAP.  Which is how it should be.  Do what is best for the patient, not insurance.

Basically I think when you have high pressure, they need to help out with expirations a bit.  They gave me 2 numbers for my titration.  One was inspiratory, and the other was expiratory. 19/13  She tried all the differnt modes out on me.  The list of abbreviations that she recited was very long.  Bipap worked the best.

Carrie, I didn't know you could "flunk" CPAP on your titration. That's interesting - maybe they'll prescribe Bi-pap to begin with.  I don't see my doctor until 9/3, so I won't know til then.

Thanks for your reply. Now I know I wasn't imagining the pressure changes!

jrinker