I was in Florida for a few weeks -- a change from my home in VA. Almost immediately, I started feeling worse, more tired during the day, a little more grumpy...almost like I was starting all over again on my auto titrating bipap therapy. I was checking the daily numbers (ahi, leaks etc) on the LCD of my respironics auto bipap and could see that the averages were going up. After a about a week (I didnt want to be obsessive and wanted to give it chance), I pulled out the reader and looked at the stats for the individual days and the trend.
As I would have guessed, my AHI (mostly AH) climbed from about 1.1 ish pre Florida to about 3 while in FL. My average pressure numbers on the autotitration were rising from about 9/12 to more like 15-16 on the inhalation (dont remember the exhale at the moment).
I made several dramatic changes and almost immediately all my numbers started heading in a more positive direction (AHI average around 1.1 with a number of nights below that)...pressure coming way down etc. I started to feel better (except for a later bout of asthma which I think was unrelated)
Here's my question:
I understand that "they" say that waking up every 12 minutes (ie 5x an hour is normal :-)
I reported my experience to my sleep doctor and he said that it was unlikely that my feeling better was related to that small a drop in my AHI and that it was a coincidence....and that anything under 5 is considered normal. He said that there were NO studies that showed any difference in sleep quality once you got under 5 AHI. So, their would be no difference in how someone feels at 5 AHI versus 1....
I like him and he has worked pretty well with me during this period....and we are entitled do our differences, I suppose.
I am eager to hear what your experiences have been once you get under the "normal" AHI 5 range.
(As an aside, and not to bias your responses, I am betting that the 5 is normal number has something to do with insurance cut offs. It is impossible for me to think that people REALLY think that waking up 40 times in one night is OK or normal. (5AHI x 8 hours).
What does your experience suggest?
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