Shortness of breath
After decades of insomnia, RLS, and OSA, I've finally been making progress with my sleep. I'm now able to fall asleep most nights without any sleep aids, and sleep most of the night with the PAP therapy. My numbers are beginning to improve (usually AHI below 3) as I've been adjusting my machine. My daytime sleepiness is greatly reduced, although not completely gone.
One thing I'm now noticing is that if I have a successful night's CPAP therapy, when I get up in the morning I feel a bit short of breath. It doesn't feel like oxygen starvation (I know what that feels like). It just feels like I can't breathe properly. This feeling goes away after an hour or two and then I feel fine until the next morning.
I don't have this feeling before I take of my mask in the morning. So it seems to be that my body learns how to breathe with the help of the machine during the night, and then has to adjust to suddenly being without that support.
Does that make sense? Is this familiar to anyone else?
Note, I was first diagnosed in 2012, but haven't been able to tolerate the therapy until recently.
05-12-2024, 03:39 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-12-2024, 03:46 PM by staceyburke.
Edit Reason: wrong machine
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RE: Shortness of breath
Most of us need more than an explanation, we look at data and that data is produced with the use of OSCAR. That software is totally free to download and use. It is available at the top of the site. Please use it with a SD card (32 gb or less) in the machine while you sleep. If it is not in the machine you will lose the data.
From you left panel you have your pressure 5-20 which is what many DME set it to as a default. 5 is almost alway to low for most adults. I for example need at list 9 min pressure or I feel air starved. I would suggest you set your Machine to 8-20 and see if that makes a difference. If you have proiblems breathing out you can turn on EPR to full time. EPR is exhale relief pressure which if you have 8 as a min you can set EPR to 3 and that would give you an exhale pressure of 5 that you have now with the inhale pressure of 8. (Min 8 - 3 EPR =5.
Sorry What I gave you was for a Resmed machine. Yours does not have EPR but I would still try the 8 min to see if that helps.
I did not see the type of machine befor I first posted.
RE: Shortness of breath
Thank you for taking the time to reply. However, it feels as though you weren't understanding my post. My breathing is fine during the night while I'm using the machine. I only notice the problem first thing in the morning after I take the mask off and get out of bed.
I will correct my user profile data to better match what my current therapy is. I have three machines, and I don't always use the same one.