First time therapy, settings and progress

[Schernenk]

Bwahahahaha, she's not just my beta tester – she's also my quality assurance, bug detector, and user experience guru all rolled into one... and she doesn’t even charge for it!

AirCurve 10 en route from CPAPspecials, quick turn around, so far so good. 

[Schernenk]

On a good note, my Oscars are looking good in my opinion OTHER then the constant flow limitations.  I have really gotten used to the mask, have gotten good mask fit and reduced AHI events to near zero, the UAR is the missing link I hope (lots of class 2 UAR when zoomed)

[Sleeprider]

Well, your flow limits don't even show up in the 95% statistic, so you're doing okay. It's pretty rare to not have some show up in the chart. You've resolved the big stuff.

[UnicornRider]

Everything Sleeprider says is true.

Now to get a more in-depth view of the Flow Limits. Re-scale the Y-Axis of your Flow Limits Graph so that the Max is 0.30.

Then pin your Flow Rate, Flow Limit and Mask Pressure Graphs. Now when you go granular and zoom in on those Flow Limits you can see the difference in Flow Rate wave shape peaks with the severity of Flow Limits, also you will see the difference in Mask Pressure.

 It is a good exercise, when you get the AirCurve 10 VAuto, fine tuning will utilize the same skills.

You could try bumping your Pressure minimum to 10 cmH2O. Your Median Pressure from the Statistics area of the left hand panel is 9.96 cmH2O. It may reduce the pressure swings slightly.

[Schernenk]

Thanks, great info, I will need to get into the minutiae a little.  

Pretty much my inspiratory flow shape isn't great but the flow limitation is in check, I guess I'm not sure how much my inspiratory shape could play into things.  My biggest issue is I sleep through, have a low AHI, good leak rate and flow limitation, but am just not hitting much REM sleep (feeling crappy during the day).  So really I am just hopeful that the BiLevel will correct the flow shape and maybe increase REM/sleep quality overall...I'm almost there.

PS Sleeprider, CPAPSpecials shipped the machine from Florida yesterday and according to tracking it has already landed in British Columbia, (over 3000 miles), overnight!  I expect it in my hands by Friday, so potentially Florida to my podunk town in Canada of 10,000 in 3 days!!  Duty and tax was only $60 CDN, so I will be into the machine for $300 less then the sale priced unit from Canada.  Thank you very much for that lead.

[Sleeprider]

Glad to hear the machine is working out. I think once we start setting up, you're going to start at PS 4.0 with whatever EPAP min makes your day. I'm kind of thinking EPAP min 6.0, Max IPAP 13.0 and PS 4.0, Trigger sensitivity at medium or high, and I'm inclined to go high even though you don't have centrals.

[Schernenk]

First night with the Aircurve.  CPAPSpecials for the win, 2 nights and my machine was here Thursday, and saved me $300 over the sale price from the Canadian online retailer, highly recommended.

Anyway lets get to it.  In my opinion I did better last night from a sleep quality perspective, events are low, highest leak rate came right after an event and a ramp in pressure...so far so good.  Initial setup was per SleepRiders suggestions, PS was 4 and the pressure didn't bounce around to much except at that one event but maybe I could tighten up the range a bit?  I'm pretty excited, last night felt good, any input is appreciated.

[Schernenk]

Here are a few more with some zooms, flow rate profile is definitely more plump on the whole.

[UnicornRider]

I figured we would not be able to keep your button pushing fingers out of it.

To knock your Flow Limits down, try increasing your Pressure Support to 4.4 cmH2O.

You should see additional plumping of the upper curves.

If that helps control the Flow Limits, you should not see the pressure excursions to the upper pressure limit.

Go ahead and rescale your Flow Limits Graph so that your max is 0.50 it will help find those distorted wave shapes.

[UnicornRider]

How are you doing?

    Have you got the new machine dialed in?

       How is the sleep quality?

          Requiring Minds Need to Know.