CA's, Mask type, and leaks/vent

[robysue]

NOW FOR THE GOOD NEWS!
Last night out of desperation I took the plunge and cranked the EPR to 3. My night was much improved. And my AHI was 1.02 but the best part is only 4 CA's all night. AND, 90% pressure equal to 8.38. AND, when I woke up at 4 (not 3) I stayed awake and was comfortable.

The data looks excellent. And an important part of why I think the data is excellent if that you report that data is that you were more comfortable during the night.

If this is the answer, then I can work on the OAs from last night. I will post the graphs here in a few minutes so you can see what I am talking about. I did stop and start the machine out of curiosity and not because of my comfort level.

You had a grand total of 3 well spaced OAs all night long and one H. Even a person with totally normal sleep--i.e. NO sleep apnea---can experience that number of OAs during a full night of sleep.

In other words, I don't think there's anything to be gained by "working on the OAs." The things you need to work on right now are learning how to sleep comfortably all night long. In other words, you do still have a four clear awakenings in the second half of the night, but they do not appear to be triggered by anything in particular. Sometimes it just takes time to get used to sleeping with the machine. But the fact that you were more comfortable with the machine meant that you didn't get trapped in an uncomfortable and long sleep-wake-junk period.

I hope this is not a fluke.

Baby steps. Remember everything about PAP therapy is "baby steps." There's a lot of 2 steps forward, one step backwards when you are finally really starting to get your therapy straightened out.

Look for trends rather than focusing on individual "bad" nights. And keep in mind that comfort is an important part of defining a good night: Obtaining a 0.0 AHI at the cost of doing things that make your subjective sleep quality worse is not going to make you feel better in the long run. If you are waking up rested and refreshed on most days, but your AHI is in the 2-3 range instead of the <1 range, it's time to just enjoy waking up rested and refreshed instead of twisting yourself into knots to get the AHI a bit lower.

[E.W.]

I know I need a newer machine ect. my older Remstar auto with Encore Basic doesn't give me data on centrals. But in my reading I came across an article
about sleap apnia in people with heart failure. In it they noted that when
these people went through a cardiac rehab program they didn't experience any
fewer OSA events but they experienced a great reduction in CA events I believe the reduction was averaging about 66% fewer centrals.