Hosehead Life

Posts Tagged ‘Dr Visit’

I have been waiting to do another post till I had a chance to go in and have my follow up appointment with the doc.  I just had that yesterday.  This was the follow up appointment that my insurance requires in order to fully cover the CPAP.

It went well actually.  The doc said my numbers were all going in the right direction.  Since I am still snoring slightly (though nothing like I was), we bumped the pressure up a couple of notches.  All I will need to do though is after a couple of weeks drop the data card off and have the doc review it.  She will call if there are any changes to my perscription, but from now on I only need to go in annually.

So all in all, the CPAP is going great.  Still some adjustments going on, but overall far more rested on the average day than I used to be.

Well I dropped my data card off on Friday and am waiting to hear back on it.  Seeing as yesterday was the 4th business day they had it I called up.  They hadn’t heard from the doctor yet, so I checked into that.

Called the Sleep Doctors office in Fargo, they hadn’t received any data for review, but I was able to give the gal on the phone some base numbers.  (I reviewed a copy of my stats and had a few numbers to provide.  They would also be contacting the Jamestown office to get the full report.  My numbers haven’t been as good as when I first started, but my AHI (the key number) is less than half of what it was during my sleep study.

The gal from the sleep clinic said that an AHI of 8.8 (normal person should be under 5) and still snoring slightly was of concern, though is good I am doing much better.  What the doctor will probably do is review the reports and then order the pressure be bumped up a little.  I also have my follow up visit with the doctor in a month.  I have to have a follow up visit within 60 days anyways for my insurance to cover the machine.

Soooo now waiting to hear back from someone as to what the plan is, but treatment is still going fairly well.  Haven’t taken an evening nap since starting CPAP treatment and dream a lot more, which to me indicates hitting REM sleep far more than I used to.

Finally met with the doctor and got the diagnosis. Officially diagnosed with Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). (Hence the new blog, thought it might be helpful to both myself and others to blog about this.)

This diagnosis probably will not come as a shock to anyone who has (or tried to) sleep in the same vicinity as me. As a result I have spent the last few days trying to learn as much as possible about OSA, what CPAP machines do, etc. The Sleep Apnea Support forums have actually been a lot of help on this one, along with many people on there asking questions.

One of the things I learned this weekend – I never asked for specifics on the results of my sleep study.  I have no idea what my numbers came back as.  Since I am going in to the clinic to get set up with a CPAP, I did call and confirm I will be able to get a copy of my results (and prescription) from them.

So there is a lot to learn.  Should be interesting keeping track of it here.  I decided to start a new blog instead of folding it in on my personal site as it is a very specific topic and might be of help to someone else.