Well, went to the sleep doctor for my yearly check, why I could not remember making the appointment, A YEAR AGO, really, really…
Anywho, he said yes, you are sleeping fine, want anything changed. “No” says I.
45$ copay please…
They won’t get mine unless they pry it out of my cold dead hands.
I was in the army, I’m from a big family and flew small twins up in oxygen altitudes for many years. Sleep any place and wearing a face mask or with a tube stuck in my mouth, for me, it ain’t no deal. I’m lucky that way.
A couple pof years ago, a lady I knew said here husband just could not would not use his. he had bad sleep apnea and snored like I did.
He died in his sleep about 15 months later.
what do you do when you have a cold or allergy attack? I have trouble breathing through my nose because of allergies especially when I sleep. in fact right now I have really bad congestion because of an allergy attack. i take medication for the coughing all year round. And i get a cold. sinus infection a couple of times a year. My doctor wants me to get a sleep study done and I am apprehensive about a number of things but breathing is a big one.
Alice, I’ve had two sleep studies and the first was 8 years ago. I went because my wife suspected I had a problem breathing. I’m glad I didn’t brush it off, I went, and was Dx’d with severe obstructive sleep apnea (OSA).
If you do have OSA, then it’s definitely good to find that out now while you’re young(er). If the doc prescribes CPAP, try different masks to find one that’s comfortable. Like you, I too am a side sleeper.
Here’s another useful SDMB thread from a couple of years back, and Mama Zappa contributes at length there, too:
Mama Zappa, thanks for all your helpful information over the years, you slut, you! (I laughed at that!)
Alice, at first when I got my CPAP, I was skeptical. I’d use it some nights but not all nights, and when I did it’d only be for an hour or three then I’d pull it off and shut off the machine. It took a long (long!) time to get used to it but now I always use it, and always want to use it I sleep great, the missus sleeps great because I no longer snore (it was LOUD), and I am well-rested during the day.
Good luck to you, Alice. May you sleep well, and wake up well-rested.
Cold/allergy: some people will have a full face mask to use during those times, which at least allows you to breathe through your mouth. Personally, I either tough it out (if I can manage go move enough air through a slightly stuffy nose), or if I’m having a lot of trouble I’ll just take a night off. Sneezing does suck, as well as runny nose and asthma flares.
Use a full-face mask (or whatever they call it) that covers both the nose and mouth.Then you can breath easily through your mouth.
I found the nose-only masks -which are the most popular with most people–totally impossible to use. Every time I’d open my mouth for a fraction of a second, the airstream changed direction or something, and I’d start choking and feeling asphyxiated, like I was drowning. After a week of making a genuine and honest attempt to use it, I was a wreck–7 nights straight with no decent sleep.
The nose-and-mouth mask is , for me, the ONLY one to ever consider.
I use the nose only one. Only one I have tried. From first use, my tongue, or my throat or something closes it off and I can lay with my mouth open and will not breathe through it without much conscious effort.
I don’t know why?
Years of flying with an oxygen mask?
Just lucky?
A doc said it may be the way my palette is working.
I can open my mouth and breathe hard and still only use my nose if I try just a little.
If I deliberately try to breathe through my mouth while the CPAP is on & operating, it does sorta joke me up or get my breath control all wonky. Not easy to do but I have ever worked at making it work either. Might need to try that tonight and see if I can do it and still get enough air or if I can not control my reaction to it.
I can SCUBA dive without a face mask and breathe through the mouth piece only just fine. No need to plug my nose in anyway.
well that was one horrible night. The worst was the nasal cannula they insisted was the only way to count my respirations despite having a strap around my chest like a too tight shirt and one around my waist that were to measure my breathing. it poked into the skin inside my nose as well as obstructing my breathing. After 2 hours of me trying to move the damn thing so it wasn’t sticking in me and her saying it had to be there, I was almost in tears at the discomfort. She finally cut some of the prongs length off and I convinced her to tape it to my face so it changed the angle which helped. The leads were caught in my hair and every time I moved my hair was pulled. I was not allowed to sleep in my normal position and in face the attendant was rather put out that I refused to sleep on my back despite my explanation of allergies that get worse laying on my back the horrible headaches I get from sleeping in that position. I hated that crap in my hair as well, it was hard to wash out completely.
I don’t know how I will make it through another night if and when I have to go back to calibrate a cpap. She tied several types of masks on me as a demo and all of them I found hard to breathe while wearing like tying to breathe in a hurricane or something. I couldn’t exhale and inhaling was miserable as well.
Ugh, that sounds horrible. And exactly like what I pictured. I hope the second night goes better for you- maybe you’ll have a more empathetic tech, at least.
I’m still waiting for my appointment with the specialist to determine if I need a study. New patient appointments around here for almost anything take months and months. I guess it’s a good thing I’m not dying (I hope). By the time of my appointment, I am looking to have lost quite a bit of weight, so I’m thinking that will really help and I may not even need a study after all.
They gave me Ambien to sleep. They said drugs wouldn’t affect the results. I was out for 7 hours which was sufficient. The sleep specialist concluded that I had very mild sleep apnea. My pulmonary specialist reviewed the results and said that’s not sleep apnea at all.
I had some anxiety about doing it, but it turns out to be easy, just threw off my sleep schedule since they wanted me asleep by 11PM. I think I had more anxiety about a diagnosis of sleep apnea and then having to sleep with the machine.
You’re not there to be comfortable or get a good night’s sleep. Think of it like a workout, during which you need to experience a certain amount of discomfort. All you have to do is sleep just long enough for them to get readings.
There’s actually a fairly important clinical reason why the attendant was trying to get you to sleep in a different position.
That reason, however, is that your attendant was an ass (maybe she used to work at a clinic near me??). You should be able to sleep in whatever position works for you.
If you do have to go back, either go to a different facility, or talk to them beforehand and insist on a different technician. See point number 4 here.
The cannula is annoying as hell - I’m glad they finally cut the prongs off for you. Sadly, there is a clinical reason for it (a good one, this time); it measures your breathing better than what they used to use: a wire with a couple of loops to form a thermocouple. What they do for people who are consistent mouth breathers I don’t know. I would bet that they do some correlation between your chest / stomach movements and the nasal device - in fact it makes sense that they would, as if you’re struggling to breath past an obstruction, your chest might move but you wouldn’t pass any air.
The story with me and the cannula was that my third sleep study was insisted-on by the RLS specialists I visited, as the two previous used the thermocouple and they said those could miss some apneas. And when I went for the study, THEY DIDN’T HAVE ANY CANNULAS.
I pitched a fit and threatened to leave.
They found a cannula.
The CPAP does take some getting used to. Google the different types of masks, and look at what they have at cpap.com and other sites (side note: cpap.com makes it VERY clear that the manniquen head is not included. Phooey on that :D).
An article I recently came across at Medscape suggests that a “PAP Nap” may help:
In fact the clinic we go to now had something like that set up for my husband before his titration study, and I later went in for something similar - basically to try different types of masks, and they could see if the mask worked OK and if we could tolerate it. If your clinic doesn’t offer a mask fitting session before the titration, insist on it. Or go elsewhere.
It will give you a chance to try the masks, and breathe using one for more than a couple of minutes, in a setting where you’re not wired up (or at least not as much; no wires were involved when I did it) and not looking at having to sleep with it right then.
I won’t lie, it does take getting used to. Exhaling in particular was an issue with my home machine, at least until the machine “learned” my breathing pattern (I think - at least unless I’m breathing oddly it responds very quickly). There are also exhalation-relief settings on most modern machines.
As I recall, the biggest problem with the machine itself when I did the titration study was that I’d be inhaling and ALL OF A SUDDEN the damn thing would offer resistance. Uncomfortable and panic-inducing. The home machine did the same a few times. Again, I’m guessing that the circuitry had to “learn” my patterns (but I could be full of… um, hot air on that).
My machine has a “ramp” button. When I turn it on, it goes on full force (10 psi) and when I press the ramp button it goes down to 4 psi and works it’s way back to 10. By the time it gets up there, I’m already asleep.
And it takes a while to get used to using a CPAP machine and mask. But I’ve learned you’ll be surprised at what you can get used to.
You have to sleep deeply enough to get to the stages of sleep where OSA tends to be at its worst - and to that end, you have to be made as comfortable as possible.
The wires etc. are an annoyance. A major one. But they need to remove as many of the distractions / discomforts as possible given the circumstances. Otherwise, you risk false negatives (as my first 3 studies did; I know I had apnea by that point).
Anyone facing a sleep study, PLEASE read my posting in Nars Glinley’s thread (linked to above). While others say their facilities have been great and their technicians fantabulous, statistically that hasn’t proven true for me and I’m such a tramp, I’ve got a much larger sample size than most.
Interestingly, their definition of sleep is very different from yours and mine. You can be in a state where you’re relaxed and aware of stuff around you - if not perfectly alert - and not consider yourself asleep, but your brain waves are in a pattern that is considered the early stages of sleep.
So by their standards, I got far more than an hour and a half of sleep during my first disastrous study. During my daytime sleep latency test (5 20-minute lie-downs where they wanted to see if I fell asleep) I never really felt like I slept but I got into the zone enough (and quickly enough) that they counted it.
I live in a major metropolitan area, and sleep medicine has really become popular here as evidenced by the proliferation of Sleep Centers ‘R’ Us locations (joking on the name, but it does seem that everyone and their brother now operates such a facility). There’s a chain now that has several local locations - including one VERY near me - that touts itself as having very very comfy accommodations. I may seek that out next time I need a study - at the very least, it’s a hella lot more convenient than the one at my sleep clinic which is 30+ miles away through some truly awful traffic.
Other parts of the country haven’t seen this proliferation, and the locations that do exist don’t have the same competition going on that make them be better. There, you truly do need to trot out your inner bitch to make it as tolerable (and effective) as possible.
Just to update this thread, I finally had my sleep study and got the results today.
First of all, the study part really sucked. I was so insistent that I was going to bring my box fan, that was the only way I could get through it, yup, definitely bringing the fan, and then I forgot it. They had a fan there, and it was okay, but not the same as my fan. It took me what seemed like a long time to get to sleep, and I had to take one and a half Unisom, which they said was okay. I had to get up twice to go pee, which was a huge pain. I slept horribly- ostensibly over four hours but it was horrible. But all in all, it was okay.
My results showed that when I sleep on my back, I have severe apnea. Fortunately, I hardly ever sleep on my back. I mostly sleep on my side, and I have mild to moderate apnea then. I had 133 arousals, 2 apneas, and 94 hypopneas. I only spend 1/4 of the time in REM sleep than I’m supposed to, and am 66% efficient in sleeping, whatever that means. I also have lower limb movement disorder, which I assume is restless leg syndrome, but it doesn’t awaken me.
The bad news is that I currently have Medicaid, and they require much more severe apnea to cover CPAP than any other insurance, and I don’t qualify under their guidelines. I will have private insurance within a few months, but I may have to repeat the sleep study for them. I could go back and do the whole study on my back and would qualify with Medicaid for CPAP for sure, but no, I hate sleeping on my back and it would be too sucky.
The first visit with this doctor, he was so nice. Lord, he was lovey-dovey. This visit, once he told me that Medicaid wouldn’t pay for CPAP, and I wasn’t willing to pay hundreds of dollars out of pocket for it, I was silenced and swept out of the office post-haste. If I do have to have another sleep study with my new insurance, I hope I have other alternatives than him, because fuck him.
Anyway, so there it is there. Thanks again for all the different experiences and opinions. Greatly appreciated and really helped me to know what to expect.
ETA: I just saw where in my first post for this thread, I said I don’t snore on my side. That is a lie. I do, and apparently quite loudly.
I’m glad you went. If you do have to have another study see if there are other sleep labs in the area. I know of at least 3 full labs in Massachusetts. I can’t imagine you’d be forced to go to one specifically unless one of them is out of network. So, check around your area and see what other options you have.
Interesting coincidence, as I had my second sleep study just last night. The first one was pure hell. I barely slept at all, and was extremely uncomfortable. I finally gave up around 5 and had a stabbing headache all the rest of the day. However, it did confirm that I have “extremely severe” sleep apnea, and I’m only breathing roughly 2/3 of the time.
It took a couple of damn MONTHS to get me back in to do a followup with the CPAP, which, as I say, was last night, and it was DREAMY. It wasn’t the best night of sleep of my life, but it was about a million times better than the first study, and much better than an average night. I only woke up twice, and the first time was because the nose mask wasn’t working for me. After switching to the face mask, it was just wonderful. I can’t wait to get a machine at home.
Well bummer, Alice, on not having bad enough apnea to warrant treatment under Medicaid.
Yeah, if you can keep from sleeping on your back, that will help a bit, but it sounds like you do need the CPAP when you can qualify for it.
My father-in-law finally got a CPAP this year - we pushed him to get tested and he finally actually told his doctor about the snoring that has been keeping the entire Eastern Seaboard awake for the past 40 years. Seriously, the man is like the poster child for sleep apnea - meets every possible criterion, and has a number of sequelae from the apnea.
Well, he had the study, got a CPAP, and was all set to send it back because he didn’t like it. Took most of the family (and several doctors) nagging at him to retry it and work with a DME provider to find a mask and setup that would work for him - he wasn’t going to bother to try to work it out.
And he LOVES it. He’s feeling about 200% better than before he started using it.
Forgot to mention: the lower limb movement disorder might be PLMD (Periodic Limb Movement Disorder). It’s related to RLS but not identical - a significant percentage of RLSers have PLMD and vice versa, but not all. RLS tends to be when you’re trying to sit down, especially if you are drowsy or trying to relax, and you get sensations and you HAVE TO MOVE. PLMD is the involuntary movement while asleep. The treatments are similar - and for what it’s worth, RLS / PLMD can mess with your sleep cycles enough to leave you severely fatigued even if you don’t have apnea.
(I laughed at that!)
