[Treatment] Treating UARS with CPAP and bilevel

[jomama]

You can have fragmented sleep even without arousals.

How? [confused] Isn't the latter essentially the definition of the former?

[slowriter]

Think sleep staging, with waking being one stage.

So, for sake of illustration, say you don't wake up all night, but you never reach deep sleep.

Now that I think of it, not sure of the technical definition of the term, but that's what I meant.

[jomama]

Think sleep staging, with waking being one stage.

So, for sake of illustration, say you don't wake up all night, but you never reach deep sleep.

Now that I think of it, not sure of the technical definition of the term, but that's what I meant.

Yeah, I suppose it's a matter of how we define our terms. I think I'd define what you're describing as a sleep stage disorder, or whatever. When you google "what is fragmented sleep," the general consensus seems to be something along the lines of, "Fragmented sleep is when you experience frequent awakenings during your normal sleep cycle," which is what I think of when I think of (and experience, every single night) fragmented, fitful sleep: frequent awakenings (arousals) that are not a part of the normal sleep cycle.

Personally, I'm trying to figure out if my fragmented, fitful sleep is caused by SDB (since I've ruled out practically everything else), in particular, possible UARS, since I have low AHI, but have mild-to-moderate flow limitations that I'm currently experimenting with trying to quell. But many of the disturbances on my charts are not necessarily preceded by FL, and seem "spontaneous," so it's all rather confusing and frustrating. 

I don't want to hijack this thread and make it about me. At some point I'll start my own therapy thread and post some charts and ask for advice, but currently I'm still experimenting with masks, pressures, and EPR settings on my Autoset. I really don't want to go down the road of spending over $800 on a used bilevel to simply see if it might help, when I'm not even sure the FL are causing my frequent arousals. Again: super frustrating and disheartening.

[slowriter]

Seems there's some debate in the scientific literature on "sleep fragmentation" ("cortical" vs "autonomic"):

https://erj.ersjournals.com/content/17/4/723.long
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1907...t=Abstract