[Diagnosis] Recent Diagnosis; Should I Pursue Treatment?

[Cpapian]

About 10 years ago I was diagnosed with borderline sleep apnea.   AHI 9.  The sleep doctor told me to not bother with treatment.   I listened to him.  About 1-1/2 years ago, I found I was sleepy during the day.   I talked to my doctor,  and was sent back for retesting.  AHI 39. Now I am getting treatment. 


Morale of the story..... if you choose to not start treatment at this point,  keep it at the back of your mind because likely in the future you will need treatment.

[OMyMyOHellYes]

"Recent Diagnosis; Should I Pursue Treatment?"

You have the rest of your life to figure that out. Your choice may determine how long that is. Choose wisely.

OMMOHY

[Spy Car]

Are you a mouth breather? Do you need a FFM? If not a nasal mask or pillow would be more comfortable.

I'll let more knowledgeable people take the lead, but a fixed pressure of 14 seems pretty high, which would not be comfortable for me. And why not an Auto CPAP (APAP)?

Personally, I don't feel well with an AHI around 5, so projecting my experience, I'd chose therapy and look to ways to make it maximally comfortable. Bathroom breaks might not end, but I bet they'd decrease in frequency.

Best wishes in your decision making.

Bill

[bbooker703]

Thanks for the input everyone. Still pondering my choice. 

And to answer Spy Car's question, yes, I am a mouth breather.

[Gary1of2]

My test showed high mild. With the improvements on my health like , blood sugars are now at 6.0 instead of 8.8, blood pressure down no more meds, sinus are clearer, best of all not so tired more energy. It takes awhile to get used to it and you body to starg to improve and heal.

[Corvette817]

Ditto on what Chill and Walla Walla said, with !!!!!.  

One night of a sleep study does not give you the big picture.  Please get treated and get Sleepyhead and post your results over time.  Have complete bloodwork and a physical.  Check out your sleep environment (pillows, sleep positions, chin-tucking, light, noise, etc.)  I've often thought that the young need good sleep for growth, and the old...er need good sleep for repair.

Now's the time - sounds like you have insurance, a decent Doc., and the brains and caring of this forum on your side.  No one likes to think that they have something "wrong" with them, but aging comes to us all of we're lucky enough not to be dead.   

With all due respect, you know that you have a problem, or problems; re-read your first post.  

I wish you all the best for your future.

[CTcentrals]

bbooker703,

Thread's a week old, so you might have already made your decision.  If you returned your equipment, ignore the rest of this and best of luck. 

It sounds like you don't have any immediate health issues given the information you provided, although it does sound odd that you would need such high pressure for so few events and good oxygen percentage.

Rather than suggest whether it is or isn't, I'm curious about what you think would make it worth the expense, time, and hassle.  Might be easier to answer from this side, too. For example, I know I would feel better if I wasn't getting your degree of fragmented sleep, but I would also feel worse if I had a poor fitting mask and more arousals. However, if "fairly well rested" is the standard, well, there's an answer.  To me, starting to get sleepy driving is too close for comfort and too risky, but it may well be ok for you for no "close calls."  ADD symptoms overlap with many conditions, but I'm confident that if you have ADD, the lower quality of sleep is going to exacerbate it.

Ultimately, I think it's an empirical question that you can test and answer for yourself.  Trying cpap therapy off and on for a couple of weeks probably won't give you good results or a good base from which to reason and not much opportunity to adapt. If you have the equipment and you're already investing some degree of expense, time, and hassle, then you might consider doing it as effectively as possible for x-time and see what you're results are.  Also, you don't know what you don't know if you don't give it enough of a consistent effort to find out.  You might find you actually feel better than you think since you're already desensitized to whatever degree of condition you do have.

good luck

ct

[bbooker703]

Thanks for the additional input folks. I'll be trying a new mask that will hopefully address my fit problems, and will be meeting with my sleep doc next week for follow-up.

[Doza]

A few questions to flesh out the info, since otherwise the answer in your case might be a vague "it depends."

1. What persuaded you/doc to have a sleep study?
2. What persuaded your doc to proceed with a titration study?
3. What was the sleep study's definition of an AHI event? 4%+ O2 desat? 3-4% O2 desat? It should say on your sleep study.
4. Have you explored other potential health issues to explain your symptoms, so even if you did CPAP it might not address them?

Answers:

1. The sleep study was my idea, primarily based on the "honking" episodes that I have, assuming they were caused by sleep apnea, and worrying about the long-term health impacts. Less-so the occasional tiredness. (Also, my girl friend, who admittedly is a bit of a hypochondriac, helped convince me to get it checked out.)

2) After the sleep study, my sleep doctor suggested we try it. He did make it clear though that my symptoms were mild enough that the treatment was questionable.

3) Does this answer your question: Hypopneas: 4% or >; RERAs 2% or less desaturation; AHI with 4% oxygen desaturation or greater.

4) I've investigated other causes to some degree, but not thoroughly.

By 'honking', do you mean snoring, or closed-throat grunting when upright and exercising?   Just curious, because I cop the latter and with almost a year of training resulting in greatly increased fitness and strength, but no weight loss, I still get those grunts, every now and then.  

Hopefully the new mask will make things easier for you.

[SarcasticDave94]

Being on the borderline on AHI creates a bit of a dilemma; hence do I or don't I continue? As I'm late to the party again, you've likely decided on your action. If it were me (I am assuming the machine was an insurance paid rental) I would continue treatment and get advice here to tweak the settings to your optimal setting needs. My reasoning is that "if it were me" I would have more aggressively sought apnea treatment earlier as it may have lessened the chances of some of my other health issues I have today.

Dave