Sleepyhead analysis please

[Pappy McVader]

HI, 

Background: I've been on CPAP for a couple years now. At first my auto settings were 5-20, but I was still feeling tired. A few months later I learned to hack it and changed it to 11-20.  That seemed to do the trick, but I am still tired, but not as much as I used to be. 

However I do seem to have a lot of RERA's and I'm not sure what that means. Is there anything I should do differently?

Note: Recently been playing around with different masks.I have deviated septum and tend to be a mouth breather so have been using a FP Simplex since I began therapy. I recently tried an Amara View on Friday, but it really hurt my nose so I went back to my FP Simplex. I also tired nasal pillow mask - FP Pilairo Q with a chin strap for a nap today and the results were amazingly good, but it also hurt my nose toward the end. Thinking about trying that for a full night...

Anyway, I know this post is somewhat rambling. Thanks in advance for your advice.

Thanks,

Ty

Side note: It says my attachment limit is 200 kb as newbie, but when I went to attach my score shot it said I had 169 kb before I even had anything there. Did I do something wrong?

[Gideon]

welcome to the forum

Your numbers look great which means the important question is how do you feel?


You are not doing anything wrong, we limit new users linking because of spam issues.

I suggest you use a 3rd party (Imgur) to link content, for now just add a space to the URL (http :xxx.png) to post your data.


Fred

[Melman]

As Bonjour said, you numbers look great. RERA stands for respiratory-effort-related-arousal. RERAs are characterized by increasing respiratory effort for 10 seconds or more leading to an arousal from sleep, but do not fulfill the criteria for a hypopnea or apnea. Even with the number of RERAs you have your therapy appears to be effective. Your respiratory distress index (RDI), which is your AHI + RERA index is under 2, which is good.
 
It would be helpful if you post your data without the calendar and pie graph which will make more statistical data appear in the screen shot. The calendar can be minimized by clicking on the triangle (arrow) to the left of the date. To delete the pie chart select preferences from the file pull down menu. Then select the appearances tab and uncheck the box for the pie chart.

[Pappy McVader]

Thank you both! And thanks for the tips on the sleepyhead data. Will do.

I do feel ok, but I do have these big gasps of air occasionally for no reason that I can tell. I just stop breathing and then I have a big gasp of air. My airway doesn't feel blocked. They just seem to come from out of the blue and startle me. I was wondering if those are what the RERA's are?

Also,

[Gary1of2]

Inthe sleepyhead page there is a glossary of terms.

[Sleepster]

I just stop breathing and then I have a big gasp of air.  My airway doesn't feel blocked. They just seem to come from out of the blue and startle me. I was wondering if those are what the RERA's are?

If the airway is not obstructed, but you stop breathing for 10 seconds or mare, that's called a central apnea. The algorithm that's responsible for raising the pressure supposedly ignores central apneas, but you will se them as events in your SleepyHead charts.

[ajack]

It would help if you get rid of the calendar and pie chart next time. It makes it easier to see the stats in that column 
It may just be the sleep awake junk as you are falling asleep, the chart doesn't show significant CA. I wouldn't be concerned if that was my chart

Your results are good and there is no need to change anything, any doctor would be happy with this.  If you want to, you could increase the minimum to 10 and then 10.5 to see how it helps the snoring and H that are left. The max can be brought back to 14, they say it helps the algorithm if it's closer to the actual max pressure.

[trish6hundred]

Hi Pappy McVader,
WELCOME! to the forum.!
Good luck to you with CPAP therapy, stic around for more responses to your post.

[Pappy McVader]

It would help if you get rid of the calendar and pie chart next time. It makes it easier to see the stats in that column 
It may just be the sleep awake junk as you are falling asleep, the chart doesn't show significant CA. I wouldn't be concerned if that was my chart

Your results are good and there is no need to change anything, any doctor would be happy with this.  If you want to, you could increase the minimum to 10 and then 10.5 to see how it helps the snoring and H that are left. The max can be brought back to 14, they say it helps the algorithm if it's closer to the actual max pressure."

Thanks! I'll give that a go (lowering max to 14). I had the minimum set to 11, but wasn't sure if i should be so spot on to my optimal pressure which seems to be 11. I figure starting at 10 give me bit of ramp time without using ramp time, if that makes sense.

[quiescence at last]

The max can be brought back to 14, they say it helps the algorithm if it's closer to the actual max pressure.

I have not seen anything that suggests that the algorithm respironics devices use acts differently with a closer maximum pressure, except to prevent over runs.  And, you don't seem to have that issue.

I don't think there is much reason to change either the minimum or the maximum, as the results of current settings seem to be good.  But, I totally understand if you wish to try some adjustments, and ajack suggestions are good ones to try.

QAL