Sierra

Whether it is a problem or not depends on how bad the leaks are. If you go by the green happy face on the AirSense 10 machine you can be mislead. I have found that it takes a really bad leak before the red grumpy face shows. The best way to find out how much your mask is leaking is to copy your data from the AirSense to your computer and view the results in SleepyHead. It tells you what the leakage is all through the night, and when it exceeds the leak redline. When it goes over the leak redline ResMed claims that apnea detection is impaired, and as a result it does not increase pressure in response to potential apnea events it is not sure about. Then when the leak ends, the pressure is low and you can get a series of apnea events. So how the leaks affects things kind of depends on how bad they are. The other issue with a P10 is that one can open their mouth in the night and that can be a fairly large leak too. Again you can kind of tell that in SleepyHead.

In general with the P10 mask I try to sleep with my face on the outside of the pillow so the mask hangs over the edge of the pillow a bit. I think this prevents it from dislodging and leaking. I also use a fairly soft pillow with a down alternative fill. My feeling is that the down alternative does not push back like a foam or memory foam pillow. It gives a bit so as to not dislodge the mask.

But, your best bet is to download SleepyHead so you can see what is really happening. See this snips from SleepyHead. Both were with the P10 mask. In general I am happy when leaks stay below the 24 L/min leak redline. The graph gets grayed out when you go over.

Bad Night

Good Night

It strikes me that making a recommendation that mild sleep apnea (5-15 AHI) should not be treated, is like saying those who smoke 15 cigarettes a day are in no danger of getting lung cancer. It could be true. Or it could not be true. And you only know for sure when you get lung cancer, or die from something other than lung cancer.

I don't understand how a hose or mask that was washed thoroughly with vinegar, soap and water, and tap water rinsed could have anything infectious on/in it. If one washes the hose and mask weekly in this manner I would strongly suspect that the most clean it is through the week, would be right after it was cleaned.

Just to be clear, what they do is going to depend a lot on the clinic and your insurance, your country and region... Technically I believe it is quite possible to go directly from a diagnosis to an APAP machine, if there are no complicating factors. Whether they will do it or not may require some negotiation. I would go at it from the angle that you do not want to do another in lab titration test. Also, ask for the report and discuss whether there is any indication that an APAP would not work for you.

Sorry to hear you had a bad experience. I did my sleep study at home, and it did not go well either. I was very anxious as I was worried the test was going to say I needed to go on a PAP machine, and I really, really, did not want to. A few times I thought about getting up and throwing the whole thing out the window, but then thought about the cost, and decided against it. In any case I got through it, and they said it was enough for a diagnosis, and now I use an APAP every night.

The good news about your experience is that if they offered you a PAP machine at 1:00 AM they must have enough data for a diagnosis. And it would appear you have apnea to the degree it requires treatment, which perhaps is not such good news. But, apnea is treatable, and much better to have something you can do something about. The other good news is that the second half of the night was likely going to be a titration test to determine how much pressure you need for a CPAP. The titration test is not really necessary, unless they detected something unusual. Instead they could give you an automatic machine, APAP, and let you do a home trial at your own leisure. Just make sure they set it up in the office for you so you feel you are comfortable and getting enough air.

You should ask for a written copy of your sleep report so you know in detail what they found.

I use a nasal pillow mask all the time, along with mouth taping. I have a brand new AirFit F20 full face mask in my storage box, that I suppose I could use if I got a really bad cold. I dislike the mask so I really hope that situation never happens. If I am congested I just use one squirt of Walmart generic Otrivin in the affected side. I do try to minimize use of it, as it can cause a rebound effect. My experience is that with a nasal mask and mouth taping my nose stays clear all night if I start with a clear nose.

It looks like you now have good data in SleepyHead from Jan 7 on. From what I can see it appears to be only reporting unclassified and hypopnea events. Your AHI is not all that bad. Total time apnea seems on the higher side, but better recently. From the statistics page it looks like the machine is running pretty much at maximum 20 IPAP and 14 EPAP. There is not a lot one can tell from the statistics page beyond that. Similar with the Overview page. To tell more you would need to post your Daily Detail page. Bonjour may be able to help you better than I can with your BiLevel machine. It should be capable of going up to 25 cm of pressure, so the machine is not the limit. Your current setting of max IPAP of 20 is the limit. That said I noticed you reported you were suffering from Aerophagia, and that is often related to pressure. Perhaps once you get used to the pressure, an increase in pressure may be in order.

You got a good buy on the ResMed AirCurve 10 VAuto. You can do pretty much everything with it that you could do with an AirSense 10 AutoSet. About the only thing I can think of that is missing is the AutoRamp feature, which is nice but not essential. And the ability to use EPR in ramp only is there, but only for the CPAP mode.

That was kind of what I suspected. Probably the best way out of the situation you are in is to post one or two of your ResMed AirCurve Daily Detail screenshots from SleepyHead. It should give a good idea where you are now, and how it could be best set up. To use SleepyHead if you do not have it, you need a PC or Mac and a SD card reader. The general process is to take the SD card from your machine and let SleepyHead copy the data on it. SleepyHead can then display the detailed data so you can see how well it is working for you. The software is free. Some links:

SleepyHead download

SleepyHead basic manual

It would now be better to not scrunch down the Flow Rate as much. It is OK if AHI slips off the bottom I have not found the AHI graph to be really useful. Also not so much zoom in on that RERA event. It is hard to see the shape of the inhale and exhale flow. If you zoom out and put the RERA event off to the right it should be easier to see if there is any flattening, and if there are any other events leading up to it. Something more like this: