Intense air exhaust
Hey,
I've recently become a CPAP user. It has been a series of mostly psychological hurdles, as my brain is trying to resist undoing 33 years of sleeping without a mask. The most recent hurdle now is that my machine is releasing enormous quantities of air. It occurs after I've fallen asleep for a few hours, then becomes loud enough to wake me up, and can be heard over even my ceiling fan set to high. I don't believe it's a mask seal issue, as it is still enclosed when I wake up, and the sleep report information does not show the mask seal as anything other than good. The obvious culprit would be the pressure range, or perhaps one of the mask comfort settings. My current pressure range is 4-15. I've tried lowering the maximum pressure, but I noticed that my AHI rises pretty significantly.
Any insight or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Most relevant information about my machine should be on the left.
Many thanks.
RE: Intense air exhaust
Welcome to the forum. What's going on is your flow limitations are out of control. We normally like to see the 95% Flow Limits stat at or less than 0.10.
The flow limitations are driving pressure up. The best tool you have is EPR, you have it set to 1, set it to 3. To allow. The EPR to work set your min pressure to 7. This will allow your min exhale pressure to be 4, the machines minimum.
At this pressure you should not need the ramp so consider turning it off.
RE: Intense air exhaust
Welcome to the Apnea Board,
I was going to say the same as Gideon. Your very high flow limits are driving pressure up. Edit as he suggests.
I've used an Amara View myself and found it was a source of frustration when it came to keeping leaks down. Leak control came at the sacrifice of comfort. I had to move on to other masks before therapy could become effective. I tried ResMed F20 which was an improvement. Better yet for me is the Fisher and Paykel Vitera. My issue with the Amara View was side sleeping broke seal easily, and made it useless.
INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEBSITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
RE: Intense air exhaust
Good job on organizing and posting the graphs. I see you've gotten great advice already. I think the snoring will lessen too with the new settings advised.
Sometimes all it takes is a small adjustment.
RE: Intense air exhaust
My opinion is that there's 2 things holding you back, mask leaks signified by the spikey leak trace and still too high flow limits. And these 2 combined can become a catch 22 where one feeds the other which makes them both worse. More detailed on what I mean, either leaks steal a bit of therapy efficiency and flow limits then go up requiring more pressure to combat flow limits and then it leaks more and flow limits stay up. Or flow limits are up because of mask leaks, then the PAP increases pressure because of flow limits and then it leaks more, and then... The cycle repeats itself.
Just my take but I'd tackle leaks by trying to make it seal better by a redo of the straps adjustment, and make certain the cushion is the right size for you. But do not go tight with the straps. Too tight ain't right. If it hurts, retry the strap tension, get another size mask cushion, or get a different mask.
To combat flow limits further, it's probably going to need more min pressure since EPR 3 is active. But right now that might set up more leaks.
Leaks get you another way too. They can disrupt your sleep.
INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEBSITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
