Tell me about your sleep study

In My Humble Opinion
1

TheKid (18) has been referred for a sleep study and keeps asking me what is going to occur - I have no freaking clue.

She has always had sleep issues. For a few years she just could not fall asleep. She would be up until 1am, finally sleep, then wake up at 6am for school. Usually, by Thursday she would be such a wreck that she would fall asleep right after coming home and sleep right through until the following morning.

Now, she falls asleep just fine at a decent time; however, she cannot stay asleep. She kept a log for a few weeks to bring to her doctor. She has been averaging 4 episodes of waking up for anywhere bewteen 5 minutes and 30 minutes every night.

She has tried white noise. She has tried OTC meds. She has tried relaxation techniques. Nada.

So now on to the sleep study- what happens? Can she bring her usual bedstuff (blanket/pillow)? She has a hard time falling asleep anywhere other than her bed as it is, what can she do to make it work? Anything else to suggest to her?

2

I don’t have any suggestions. My sleep studies were totally miserable experiences- they wire you up with electrodes on your chest, head, arms, legs and anywhere else they can think of, and then rig it all up in such a way that you can’t sleep in any position but flat on your back.

I happen to be a side or stomach sleeper, so I only slept for like 35 minutes on either sleep study.

Combine that with the strong suspicion (that my doctor did nothing to remedy) that the whole exercise was intended to sell me a CPAP machine and a couple of expensive sleep studies rather than a legitimate medical procedure, and I don’t have anything resembling a fond memory of the experience.

That being said, the place was clean, nice and the staff was terrific, so that’s something.

3

My experience mirrors Bump’s. I fell asleep more often, but they also woke me up at least twice because I would turn and dislodge a sensor.

Regards,
-Bouncer-

4

Oh, boy. She’s a side sleeper and puts a pillow over her face. That’s not including the fact that she cannot sleep unless her bed is against a wall and she is finicky about her blankets.

5

You can bring whatever you need to sleep, aside from a bedmate. Bring jammies, pillow(s), blankey, and teddy bear. I suggest something to read, as well.

My tech got a little miffed that I wanted to read a bit before falling asleep. Coming in to the room and saying, “Are you ready to go to sleep now?” seems a bit stupid.

You are wired up like crazy, and if you need to take a midnight potty break, the tech has to come in and unplug you.

Even if you DO fall asleep, it sure as hell won’t be restful. You’ll have glop in your hair when you leave in the AM (from the electrodes), so stopping at Starbucks is awkward.

Don’t plan on anything the next day. You’ll simply go straight home and crash.
~VOW

6

Ditto what the others have said.

I’ve had two sleep studies (before and after CPAP). Both were, if not miserable, at least uncomfortable and tiring. You’re wired up like a cyborg and it’s difficult to turn or move at all. A collection of closed-circuit cameras are watching and filming your every move (don’t scratch!), and technicians are in and out of the room adjusting electrodes, etc. frequently. In my case, the room was roughly the temperature of my freezer because that’s how the techs liked it. In the midst of all this discomfort and cyborg gear, they tell you to relax and sleep “just like you normally do”. :rolleyes:

In the end, I got a CPAP machine whose settings and software are more tightly controlled than military weapon circuitry. I had absolutely no control over the machine’s settings. If you discover you can’t sleep because the “blow” portion of the cycle is too high, do you turn a knob to lower it? Of course not. You schedule a doctor’s visit, followed by an evaluation (and sometimes another study). If the over-educated control freaks finally meet a week later and deign to consider lowering the setting from ‘8’ to ‘7’, you might come back in for another consultation. At this point you get a sort of prescription to change the machine, and you can drive across town for another lengthy appointment with some other tech who hasn’t yet gotten his cut of the scam… and he hooks the machine to his computer and (drum roll) selects ‘7’ and ‘Apply’ on his screen.

You’re sent back home to see if this works. Of course it doesn’t and everyone lines up for another swipe at your wallet while the brilliant minds re-consult and try to figure out what number comes before ‘7’. Rinse, repeat.

If you have some sort of spine problem from sitting on a too fat wallet, it will cure that. For me, I ended up tossing the machine into a cabinet and did my own research. Losing a little weight, changing the bed angle and my sleeping position cured the majority of the problems. The machine *might *have worked, if every adjustment to mask-type and force settings didn’t require multiple half-days off work and a tank of gas to accomplish.

Sorry, but that’s my experience. Hope yours is better, though. Some folks swear by the studies and machines.

7

I recently was given what amounted to an in-house sleep test. It consisted of a recorder/computer* and several plastic tubes. Two of the tubes had to be taped down to ensure they entered my nostrils. Another was a tube that ran from a pulse monitoring device that had to be taped into position. It was similar to the device commonly used in a doctors office except it had no means of clamping it in place. what the results of all this are unknown----the doctor knows but she won’t tell me until my next office visit.

  • this device had to be held in place by straps around my chest. Very uncomfortable.
8

I have had several sleep studies. My biggest complaint is that they make you get up and leave early in the morning when what you really want to do is just sleep!

It really all depends on your technicians. If they are nice and treat you well, then that’s all it takes for me. Technicians who keep pushing you to hurry up are awful.

I actually didn’t find the experience unpleasant. You go in, shower, whatever you need to get ready for bed. They attach electrodes all over your body, and you go to sleep. You do get time to read or watch TV for a bit if you want.

9

I’ve done a dozen or so. It helped pay my way through school (I was a normal control).

This was back in the 80s, but for me it was a blast. Ideal sleeping conditions (temperature perfect, white noise generator) and the techs were very nice. Plus I got paid very well. IIRC I got $200 for “normal” studies and $325 for ones that were “embarrassing” (studies looking at penile tumescence during sleep, involving a mercury stretch gauge placed at the base of the penis).

10

BUMP exactly describes my sleep study except that I get about 6 hours of sleep. The place was very comfortable and the staff was friendly and nice but they were technicians. They hooked up and ran the equipment. They didn’t explain anything.

Every time they discussed the results with me they rounded the numbers to make it look more like I needed the mask and system they were selling. 77%, the actual number, became 70%, which is some threshold for a second study. There were plenty of other statistics they gathered as part of the process but they selected the one that was closest to “bad” and were only interested int that. I just didn’t trust what they were telling me.

11

Luckily, she’s not looking at getting a CPAP, it’s more trying to find out what is causing her to wake up. We were talking this morning - she has very vivid dreams and when they end is when she believes she is waking up. Of course, her wake time is longer when she has a nightmare.

12

I agree with the unpleasantness of it all. Not mentioned yet, though, was the wake up. It wasn’t a gentle tap and a “Mr. N, time to wake up.” It was lights on, a harsh “WAKE UP!”, and solvents being poured on my scalp.

All this to tell me something had been telling me all along: I snore. But at least I had the priveledge of wearing my jammies on the subway.

MissTake, are you sure your daughter really needs this?

13

[QUOTE=pullin]
In the end, I got a CPAP machine whose settings and software are more tightly controlled than military weapon circuitry. I had absolutely no control over the machine’s settings.
[/QUOTE]

When my husband got his CPAP, the tech said that he was going to start out on 8 or whatever it was, and that most of his patients wind up running the machine on auto. By the end of the visit, I was convinced that the machine (a ResMed S9 is a rather clever bit of kit) was smarter than the tech.

After a couple weeks, I found the setup menus and changed the thing to auto as “8” was apparently like trying to breathe when connected to a leaf blower. At the next visit, the tech had a hissy fit and was all set to report us to the government for changing a doctor’s prescription. :rolleyes:

Right there, in his office, we called the doctor’s office, asked if they had any objections to using the machine on auto vs not using it at all, and got a referral to a new CPAP provider.

14

If she normally has a hard time getting to sleep, it doesn’t seem to me that a sleep study is going to be any worse than a normal night. If you have a decent clinic, you get a nice, clean room. It’s like staying the night in a hotel. Yeah, you’re wired up to a bunch of equipment, but I saw it like having a new and strange experience. Really, the purpose isn’t there to necessarily give you a comfortable night’s rest. it’s to try to find out what’s wrong.

It seems like her problem is some kind of insomnia rather than sleep apnoea. If it were the latter, it would be important for her to get some sleep during the study so they could study the apnoea. But if it’s not the case, then there isn’t the added stress of “I really have to get some sleep tonight or I’m going to have to do this all over again!”

I don’t understand this. For me, the physician, the sleep clinic, and the equipment supplier are three, separate, unconnected parties. The physician orders the study. The clinic delivers the results. The physician looks at the results and writes a prescription, which is filled by the equipment company. The insurance company pays all three independent of each other. It’s of no benefit to the sleep clinic to skew the results.

15

I’m a bit of a pro at this, sigh. My writeup is here - feel free to redact as needed for TheKid. I’ll try not to repeat much of that below.

To answer your questions directly:
So now on to the sleep study- what happens?
She’ll arrive there mid-evening, and get checked in and taken to her room. A bit of time to relax / get used to the room, and then they’ll have her change into her night clothes and sit in a chair while they wire her up. Electrodes glued to numerous spots on her scalp, taped to her forehead, transducers of some sort near the eyes and under the nose, some EKG leads on the torso (I think), probably some leads on her legs to detect leg movements, a pulse oximeter on one finger, a chest band or two to measure respirations, etc.

Not too long after that, they’ll put her to bed. Yeah, they have to help - she’ll be wired to a gazillion different leads and won’t be able to move much on her own. They’ll turn out the overhead lights, step out, and then she’ll hear a voice coming from a speaker asking her to go through a few exercises (blink your eyes, clench your jaw, etc.) to make sure the leads are picking things up. She may have a bedside lamp that she can control if she wants to read a book or something.

Then, she goes to sleep. Yeah, right. I won’t kid you, it is tough to fall asleep in those circumstances, especially for someone who has to have everything just right (like me). And of course you can’t take anything to help you sleep, because that skews the test results. But hopefully she’ll get some sleep, enough to get some useful data.

Then at about 5:30 in the morning, they wake you up, usually when you’ve finally fallen into something like a sound sleep. They remove all the wires etc., and you can leave. Most places have some kind of shower facilities right there, but I’ve never done so - I prefer to go home and shower in my own bathroom.

  • Can she bring her usual bedstuff (blanket/pillow)? *
    Absolutely - I would strongly encourage her to bring pillows at least, and a specific blanket if she likes. I wouldn’t bother bringing sheets because you never know what size the bed is, plus that’s just one more thing to lug.

*She has a hard time falling asleep anywhere other than her bed as it is, what can she do to make it work? Anything else to suggest to her? *Lots of hints in that other thread. Biggest one is to bring things to make her comfortable, and reduce the impact of distractions. If she doesn’t have an iPod or something similar, get her one. It can be her treat for going through the study :). Being sleep-deprived going into it (more so than usual, that is) is a big help as well. And obviously she should avoid any kind of stimulants for a day or so (no triple-shot espressos etc.).

16

Pssst: you can find a way to get into the “provider” settings and tweak the settings of your unit yourself. Note that I really do not recommend actually doing this, as you might be doing the wrong thing. However, I had to do so myself to tweak the damn display settings (it wouldn’t tell me my AHI or highest-pressure readings otherwise!).

17

Not a problem. Really. She’ll be able to sleep on her side. Any position change requires a bit more logistical thinking than she’s used to, but she will be able to get onto her side. The extra pillows will help with that.

Can’t promise she’ll have a bed against a wall (I think only one of the clinics I’ve been to had that). And the pillow over her face shouldn’t be a big issue, though they might ask her to not do that initially while they’re doing the calibration readings. If said pillow causes her to start to suffocate, of course, the pulse ox will send off some alarms and they’ll come running in!!

Before she does the study, though: have you discussed with the doctor just what they are hoping to see? I’m mostly familiar with the studies in the context of CPAP / RLS issues, not insomnia per se. Are they hoping to see unusual brainwave / sleep phase issues or something?

18

From what I’m getting from her physician, they want to see if she really is coming completely awake after REM, what may cause it (physical or mental), or if it may be environmental. As I noted above, she’s always had sleep issues - from refusing to sleep in her room, inability to fall asleep, to being completely exhausted after a good nights sleep. Now this. She just wants to sleep like a ‘normal’ person. Add to it, her father and I have had sleep issues in our past (dunno about him now, though) and the doctor thinks there could be something hereditary.

19

There is a new, state-of-the-art sleep study clinic near me, in a very small town. They are affiliated with a nearby hospital. They are very, very busy.

All the facts are not yet in, but there is some investigation going on involving conflict of interest. The clinic is owned by a group via the hospital that may involve physicians who profit from the clinic. Similar situations come up occasionally with pathology labs, etc.
ETA: Kinda similar to this.