Need some help, getting better/more sleep

[Marvie]

Hi All,

I've been on CPAP almsot 2 years now, but still not feeling rested. I've already tried somethings on my own, but it seems that I can't quite get it figured out. I'm currently using an pressure of 7.4-8 with an EPR of 3, I've been trying to keep that low to avoid getting air in my belly. I changed from an N30i mask to a N20 mask, to get rid of a lot of the leaking (liked the N30i better, but wanted to make sure that the leaking is not waking me up).

Almost everyday, it seems that I have trouble sleeping with the CPAP. If I'm tired enough I can fall asleep with the CPAP, but nearly every night I wake up restless after about an hour. It then mostly takes 1 - 2 hours again to get back to sleep, after which I often can sleep about 4 hours, before waking up. Most of the time I don't feel well rested at that time, sometimes I can sleep another hour without a mask. I'm not sure if I just need more sleep, or better sleep quality.

I've attached 3 screenshots of last night, 1 of the full night, 1 close up at the beginning of the night and one later. For me what stands out is that in the beginning of the night I seem to take a couple of bigger breaths, followed by some smaller, then bigger and so on. I don't know if this is normal and has something to do with the sleeping fases we go through. It seems that my pulse rate (from wellue 02-ring) is nicely following this pattern. Later in the night, the pattern is gone, as shown in the last screenshot.

If anyone has an idea how to imrove my sleep, I would like to know. As I'm quite stubborn, please don't just tell me what to change, but also why.

Thanks in advance,
Marvie.

[Rickyricardo]

I'm not as experienced as many people here and my numbers are OK but I'd have to think a range of 7.4 to 8.0 is too narrow to allow an automated machine to respond to short term needs because it can't go above 8. Air swallowing or not it might help to allow some degree of variance like setting it to 7.4 to 12.

[Deborah K.]

I agree. I think 7-12 would be good, and would still be a narrow enough range to prevent stomach problems.

[Marvie]

Thanks for the advice. I will try it, and let you know.

[Rickyricardo]

7.4-8 is a bit like having an oven that has a setting from 200 to 250 degrees.

I switched from CPAP to APAP recently after getting a S11 for peanuts. Before that it was CPAP at 8.8 or 9.2.

The APAP is set at 7-12 and runs from 7, so that's lower than my CPAP, to higher than my old 8.8/9, not all the time but cyclically.

You might find that a setting of 7-12 as a start might go low for a while at 7 and higher than the ceiling you've set and back and forth. The tech is pretty good so let it try to run automatically.

It won't go to 12 just because it can, so in theory you could set it 7-20 and let it do its thing.