Welcome to Apnea Board !
As a guest, you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use.
To post a message, you must create a free account using a valid email address.
Login or Create an Account
RE: Optimal settings on resmed airsense 10 autoset
>>>Am I not supposed to keep min and max close to the 95pct?
Nope, not in my opinion. You need to give the machine some space to work. The whole point is to let the pressure stay low when you aren't having apneas, and let it go up to take care of preventing them as much as possible.That's what it is doing now. There is no single optimum pressure, contrary to the continued presence of single pressure CPAP machines in the marketplace.
INFORMATION ON APNEA BOARD FORUMS OR ON APNEABOARD.COM SHOULD NOT BE CONSIDERED AS MEDICAL ADVICE. ALWAYS SEEK THE ADVICE OF A PHYSICIAN BEFORE SEEKING TREATMENT FOR MEDICAL CONDITIONS, INCLUDING SLEEP APNEA. INFORMATION POSTED ON THE APNEA BOARD WEB SITE AND FORUMS ARE PERSONAL OPINION ONLY AND NOT NECESSARILY A STATEMENT OF FACT.
I increased EPR to 3. I seem to have 3.8 events per hour which is the highest I have had to date after starting therapy. I so developed a headache in the evening. Not sure if that has to do with shopping continuously for 6 hours. I am wondering if I should go back to 2.
06-22-2021, 04:52 AM (This post was last modified: 06-22-2021, 04:54 AM by genaccmiller.)
Deterioration after changing settings
Hello - I have posted three pics below after adjustment split as follows. The first two pics show the readings after ramp was taken off, EPR was set to 2 (I changed EPR to 3 on one day in-between and perhaps did not post that result but did not like it; so backed it to 2), min and max was set to 7 and 15. The last pic shows the readings where the only change done was ramp was added back to start at 4. Overall, I feel the condition is worse that when I had all auto. I find myself not sleeping continuously, getting very interrupted sleep by waking up multiple times during the night, many times not having the mask on. Daytime sleepiness has increased as well to before using CPAP. On the contrary when I made none of the settings changes above but let the machine run on Auto, the results were much better, I slept through the night and did not have daytime sleepiness. What am I doing wrong? Usually settings are to improve the experience and in this case I feel the experience has deteriorated. What needs to change?
06-22-2021, 01:26 PM (This post was last modified: 06-22-2021, 01:27 PM by Ratchick.)
RE:Deterioration after changing settings
By adding back the ramp, you've basically decreased the amount of therapy you're getting. I can't see what the settings are, but it looks like it's taking around half an hour to get to the therapeutic pressure - and every single time you stop and restart the machine, you lose another half an hour or so of good therapy time. You used your machine for about 5hrs 45mins (aside from the short little section that was all ramp) which means that out of the entire night, you were only getting therapy for 4hrs and 15mins roughly. You really need to turn off ramp for this reason. Was there a specific reason that you added it back?
You say that you woke up - what woke you? Was it something to do with the therapy? Was it because of a loud leak, or feeling short of breath or because you'd removed your mask in your sleep? How many times did you take your mask off?
You weren't doing that with the initial changes, and the only thing that has changed since that time was to put up the EPR to 3. EPR shouldn't affect your events but if you're more comfortable at 2 and aren't willing to continue for a couple of days at 3, then stick with 2. But one night alone is often not enough. It takes a while - especially at the start of therapy - and your latest chart is back down to almost nothing now. It could be that the EPR worsened things, but it could simply be normal variability, especially early in therapy while your body is adjusting. The frequent wakes alone are likely to make you feel less rested.
Most headaches related to apnea happen with waking and get better over the day. I suspect your headache had nothing to do with the therapy.
So: Turn off ramp. As you haven't changed your pressures as has been recommended, leave them as they are. Then try again for a few days if that was helping you feel better before. You don't automatically always feel completely better immediately. Sometimes that can take a while. But as it was making a significant difference, then give that a few days to see how you feel from more than one point of data.
(06-22-2021, 01:26 PM)Ratchick Wrote: By adding back the ramp, you've basically decreased the amount of therapy you're getting. I can't see what the settings are, but it looks like it's taking around half an hour to get to the therapeutic pressure - and every single time you stop and restart the machine, you lose another half an hour or so of good therapy time. You used your machine for about 5hrs 45mins (aside from the short little section that was all ramp) which means that out of the entire night, you were only getting therapy for 4hrs and 15mins roughly. You really need to turn off ramp for this reason. Was there a specific reason that you added it back?
You say that you woke up - what woke you? Was it something to do with the therapy? Was it because of a loud leak, or feeling short of breath or because you'd removed your mask in your sleep? How many times did you take your mask off?
You weren't doing that with the initial changes, and the only thing that has changed since that time was to put up the EPR to 3. EPR shouldn't affect your events but if you're more comfortable at 2 and aren't willing to continue for a couple of days at 3, then stick with 2. But one night alone is often not enough. It takes a while - especially at the start of therapy - and your latest chart is back down to almost nothing now. It could be that the EPR worsened things, but it could simply be normal variability, especially early in therapy while your body is adjusting. The frequent wakes alone are likely to make you feel less rested.
Most headaches related to apnea happen with waking and get better over the day. I suspect your headache had nothing to do with the therapy.
So: Turn off ramp. As you haven't changed your pressures as has been recommended, leave them as they are. Then try again for a few days if that was helping you feel better before. You don't automatically always feel completely better immediately. Sometimes that can take a while. But as it was making a significant difference, then give that a few days to see how you feel from more than one point of data.
Thanks for your reply. Just to clarify, I did set the pressure setting as recommended here min:7 and max: 15. I can turn off the ramp and try again. What woke me was the overwhelming rush of air going into my nose. So, you could say shortness of breath. I recall taking off my mask about 3 times. So, just to summarize, are you saying:
1. Keep pressure 7 to 15
2. Change EPR to 3
3. Turn off ramp
What do I need to do about waking up multiple times?
RE: Optimal settings on resmed airsense 10 autoset
Sorry, to clarify, I mean that you were advised to push the minimum up to 8.
So yes, try a minimum of 8, leave the maximum at 15 (though you stayed below 12 all night) and set the EPR back to 3.
I will take a guess that you're waking up as the machine pushes the pressure up, which hopefully won't happen as often as you adjust to the therapy and also if we can use the EPR to reduce your flow limits too. For now, just try and remember when you took the mask off and then you can look on OSCAR the next day and find out what pressure the machine was up to, if there were leaks or events going on, and so on. I don't think at this point reducing the max pressure would help much because you've had the maximum set this high or higher the whole time, and this was the only time you reported it. If it proves to be a persistent problem and not a teething issue, then there are ways to help reduce taking your mask off while asleep. Unfortunately, CPAP can take a while to get used to, it's a big change, and persistence comes in with that. But ultimately you are "treated" right now on the usual criteria, and most of this comes down to comfort and how you feel the next day. But it does get easier, even if it seems to be getting worse at first trying to sleep with everything on and getting the settings correct.
RE: Optimal settings on resmed airsense 10 autoset
(06-22-2021, 03:20 PM)Ratchick Wrote: Sorry, to clarify, I mean that you were advised to push the minimum up to 8.
So yes, try a minimum of 8, leave the maximum at 15 (though you stayed below 12 all night) and set the EPR back to 3.
I will take a guess that you're waking up as the machine pushes the pressure up, which hopefully won't happen as often as you adjust to the therapy and also if we can use the EPR to reduce your flow limits too. For now, just try and remember when you took the mask off and then you can look on OSCAR the next day and find out what pressure the machine was up to, if there were leaks or events going on, and so on. I don't think at this point reducing the max pressure would help much because you've had the maximum set this high or higher the whole time, and this was the only time you reported it. If it proves to be a persistent problem and not a teething issue, then there are ways to help reduce taking your mask off while asleep. Unfortunately, CPAP can take a while to get used to, it's a big change, and persistence comes in with that. But ultimately you are "treated" right now on the usual criteria, and most of this comes down to comfort and how you feel the next day. But it does get easier, even if it seems to be getting worse at first trying to sleep with everything on and getting the settings correct.
Ok maybe I missed it. But I did not catch the pushing up to 8. I think when they said 8 they probably mistyped 7. So let me do 8, change epr to 3, take off ramp and see how it looks. I will post results tomorrow.
