SpO2 Drops

[SEJones720]

        I have been tracking my SpO2 for a couple of weeks with a Viatom O2 ring.  I have always gotten scores of either 9.9 or 10.  Last night I woke in the middle of the night and noticed my score so far was a 7 and that my O2 had gone down as low as 85%.  The Viatom software had counted 7 drops greater than 4% and 19 drops greater than 3%.  I have posted the specific time period this happened in two OSCAR attachments:  the first is of my SpO2 a[attachment=65011][attachment=65012]nd pulse rate and the second is the standard first five graphs.  I don't see anything unusual in any of the graphs other than the SpO2.    

My question for the collective wisdom is, do I need to be alarmed about this, and if so, how alarmed?

[Jay51]

Thank you very much for posting all of that data.  IMO, it looks like a sensor malfunction or malfunction of your SPO2 measuring device.  Why?  Look at your pulse rate during that period.  Just about every major spo2 drop that I have seen is accompanied by a large heart rate spike.  Your heart rate stays pretty even (a brief small spike, but then stays the same as your spo2 goes lower and lower).  The sensor could have come loose from your finger, etc. also.  

Continue to monitor it.  If it happens again, please post again.

[Expat31]

Hi, 

It is difficult to properly analyse your graphs as you have posted a zoom view of just 18 minutes, instead of being able see also a full night's data. 

However, have you seen your leak rates?

Look at the first line (LL) of your Events flag graph.

And:-
95%      34.8l/min
99.5%   39.6l/min

With the time over red line 20.8%

The machine's algorithm cannot cope in such a high leak environment. 

It means that it is unable to deliver sufficient pressure to keep open your airways, improve your therapy, and as a consequence, your SpO2 saturation.

So I think important to find the source of the leaking, being either mouth or mask..

To be sure that my observations are correct, it would  be helpful to see the full night's results, so as to be able to match up properly leaks to SpO2 drops, so as see if there is actually a clear correlation, or otherwise...

Thanks.