High altitude adjustments for iVAPS + O2 Concentrator?

[marthasecret]

My first post ever on any forum!

When I go from sea level to 9,000 feet in Colorado, I have trouble with aerophagia, gas pain, higher AHI (albeit still less than 2, but up from my usual just above zero) multiple awakening, and very dry mouth in the morning despite a humidifier and climate line.  I use a bilevel Resmed AirCurve 10 STA with iVAPs and just purchased and used a Philips SimplyGo oxygen concentrator for the past week before returning to sea level.  I am fine down here.

It seemed that the air flow was really high with the oxygen concentrator adding 2L per minute.
Plus, how to adjust for high altitude?  The AirCurve supposedly adjusts automatically up to 8,500 feet, but above that?
I have this equipment because in addition to apnea, I have myositis that affects my lung muscles and borderline anemia (hence O2 concentrator)

Resmed won't talk to me a patient and Philips SimpleGo does only concentrators--no one I can find deals with how they interact, especially at high altitude.  All my sleep studies are done at sea level, etc.   I don't want to give up living in the mountains.


thanks in advance

[PaulaO2]

There's some good threads that discuss this or close to it.

http://www.apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-...and-oxygen
http://www.apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-...f-altitude

Perhaps you can find your answer there until the experts can arrive.

[Sleeprider]

Marthasecret, higher altitude above 8000 feet MSL can be tricky as the machines are generally not calibrated to those elevations. I suspect that you are experiencing increased central apnea. You are using a ST bilevel machine at unkown pressure settings and pressure support to treat your myositis. This is a form of thoracic weakness that affects your respiration and is treated with pressure support by your ST.

Your ST is (usually) a fixed pressure bilevel machine that assists your respiratory volume by pressure support, but it's kind of a dumb machine in that it does not adapt to changing environmental conditions like altitude. There are machines that can do this such as ASV or iVAPS. One of those may be a more appropriate choice for you if excursions to high altitudes are frequent. We can help you explain this to your doctor if needed. The more intelligent machines actually target tidal volume or minute vent, rather than just push the same pressure breath after breath As a result, they are "adaptive" to your changing needs. The ST is really an old technology, and some docs have not caught up.

You have a Resmed ST-A which is capable of these functions, but we don't know your settings. I think the newest OSCAR program can read the data from your machine and let us know what is going on. Please download and install the program. If you can post a chart we can advise much more concisely.

[marthasecret]

Dear Sleeprider
I will download and attempt to post. 
If I can figure it out--i will extract sleep records from: sea level, 5000 ft without O2, 5000 ft with O2 and 9000 ft with O2 and back to sea level.  thanks much

and thanks PaulaO2 for the links

[Sleeprider]

That will be great. We can support you without data, but it's kind of like flying blind. Probably the best indication that therapy works, is how you feel. If that is not up to par, then we need to data to figure out what is going on.

It looks like winter weather is coming your way. Hopefully you or your family are skiers. I have skied at Winter Park, but when I was in college, many years ago, I worked at the YMCA Snow Mountain Ranch down the road from you. I remember Winter Park when it was a very small town, and we would stop to eat and drink at Hernandos.