I’m not sure if anyone answered your question, but treatment with a cpap is meant to raise O2 levels over time. Depending upon the severity of the apnea, it could also raise it simply by getting on the machine. I know one man this applies to - he is someone who falls asleep just by sitting down (standing up sometimes too) that’s how severe his apnea is. So, not being on the pap, he was between 90-92%, but on the pap, he would get up to 95%. The longer you’re on the machine, the more your O2 will rise on or off it. In other words, if you typically average about 96% during the day just walking around, after long term use of a cpap, you could get up to 98 to 99%.
I have what they call severe sleep apnea. My AHI is only 22, and a lot of my events happen during rem sleep, of which I only get 6 minutes of REM per night. So my sleep apnea is probably even worse than they can see. I am severe because I have to use the absolute highest pressure setting they have (24) in order to get air through the blockages in my throat. I can’t use the nasal mask because it is not able to be used with such a high pressure setting. I can tolerate lower pressures when my BIPAP is ramping up, but once it hits full pressure, it just wires me awake like I have taken a big hit of crack. I have tried and tried to no avail. The machine has been sitting under my bed bow for almost two years. My oxygen levels stay at around 88 all night long without the mask on. The lowest they go is 82, but average 88 all night long, and they never go above 90 until they put the highest pressure setting on my titration study.
I don’t think the sleep apnea directly causes type 2 diabetes, but it leads us to get it because of the diet we have due to the untreated sleep apnea. When we are tired all of the time, we use sugary foods and drinks to give us an energy boost to keep us going. I was drinking up to 15 cokes a day and eating a lot of sugary foods for the energy kick so that I could stay awake all day and work. That is what led to the higher risk of diabetes. Sleep apnea also makes high blood pressure and diabetes harder to control because of the stress hormones your body releases all night do to choking and oxygen deprivation. I might get a new sleep doctor, someone to write me a script for something that will knock me out so I can sleep with the mask on. I had to take sleeping pills and even some Nyquil just to be able to knock out enough for them to titrate me on the titration study. It doesn’t matter how tired I am, I just become instantly wired up as soon as that mask goes on my face. It never gets better. They put me on BIPAP because CPAP cannot handle the high pressures they have me on. I didn’t notice any difference when I woke up the next day after my titration study, but then again it took them 3 hours to find the right pressure setting. It was only at the highest setting that I got 1 hour of sleep with no apneas, and my oxygen went to 95 percent. I did have a few central apneas though on the high pressure setting, so they programmed the BIPAP machine to breathe for me if I stopped breathing.