Numbers are better but I feel worse

[LikeaGlove90]

First time poster!

I did a sleep test on Sunday last week.. I failed.. abysmally. I'm usually alright on tests!

I have a tester machine and bunch of masks. Got my machine on Thursday. Resmed 10 Auto.

Quick background from my test- RDI 41.7/hr ASH 34.7/hr Min SaO2 - 82%

I can't quite get something right here, i dont know what it is.

The first night I tried a Small Mask with a Small Nasal attachment (n30i). Youll see I woke up a few times, I changed it in the middle of the night to the pillows (p30i) then back to the n30i as the pillows were too uncomfortable.
First night the mask jsut felt far too small.
Friday night (no data as I didnt have in the SD card.. idiot) -- tried the "standard" sized mask with the small n30i and the same last night. It definately felt more comfortable..

Anyway.. I know I only have 2 nights of data, and not sure if this is sufficient to recommend anything, but I'm feeling like im waking up (and conciously) throughout the night, last night was better but Thurs/Fri was awful. Nomally, even with atrocious AHI, I dont ever recall waking up in the night.

Unfortunately, the few nights on the machine have been the worst sleep I've had in ages, I felt more rested off the machine than on. I know it takes time and to persevere but I don't know if something can be done to help in terms of settings on my machine? Or should I just keep going with the current "auto" settings until i have more consistant data?
Is my mask potentially an issue or does the data say its working as intended? I'm so new to this!

Thankyou,


   


   

[staceyburke]

On Sept 21st You are having some of positional apnea.  You can see positional apnea where either H or Oa events are clustered together.  There are not a huge amount but getting rid of as many as you can will lower your AHI.

Positional apnea can NOT be controlled by pressure changes.  You have to find out what position you are getting into and cutting off your own airway.  Have you changed your sleep position?  Sleeping on your back?  Using more (or new) pillows?  These things can cause positional apnea by chin dropping to your sternum and cutting your airway.  Think of it of a kinked hose – nothing can get through – you have to unkink the hose…

IF you can’t make a simple change like changing to a flatter pillow helps then you will need a collar.  I have a link to collars in my signature at the bottom of the page.  It shows people who are not wearing a collar and the SAME person wearing a collar.  There is a huge difference between the two.

I would also raise the min from 5 to 7.

[LikeaGlove90]

Thanks so much!!

On the 21st I was sleeping with a higher pillow that wraps around me in a C shape.. the reason was because in my sleep test I saw I was worse on my back and felt maybe that might help keep me on my side.. it is quite a high pillow and I have noticed a sore neck over the few days using it..
On the 23rd I just had normal pillows.. do you think I'm better sticking with normal pillows to avoid this positional apnea?

I'll go ahead and raise that min pressure and see how we go!

Any other tips/findings? So I just need to persevere through and it should naturally improve or are there other changes to make? Can you tell anything about the mask and if it's right for me according to the tests or if I need to tighten/change sizes?