The results are in

We had a Pulmonary appointment today to review Gabe's sleep study results from the test he had 3 weeks ago. The news was pretty good overall. They did half the study with oxygen and half without oxygen and then compared the two. Gabe's oxygen saturation on 1/4L of oxygen was an average of 98% throughout the night. Off oxygen, it was an average of 96.8%, which is acceptable for the airway of a child with Down Syndrome. He had a total of 5 obstructive apnea episodes the entire night. This is much improved from last fall when it was 18 times per hour. The 5 obstructions were very brief, but one of them did dip down to 89% which is pretty low. Gabe also has central apnea that they are watching. Central apnea is when you "forget" to breath while you are sleeping, thus pausing, like you're holding your breath. Gabe was waking up out of REM every 2 minutes in January due to his central apnea. This recent sleep study showed a huge improvement with central apnea. Gabe was in active REM sleep 95% of the night. He never held his breath longer than 5 seconds. This is great news. So overall, a very good report. Because of the one obstructive apnea event of 89%, the Pulmonologist did suggest keeping him on just a quarter liter of O2 as he tolerates it. He said don't stress over it...don't worry about naps, don't worry about car rides, don't worry if he pulls it off during the night. Keep it on as he tolerates. With Gabe having more energy lately and us really working on him meeting some important milestones over the next couple months, we really want him to reach his full potential. We want to give him every chance to do this, so we're playing it safe and trying to get him to wear the cannula for 3-4 more months. In November, we'll go back to Pulmonary and if he is looking good, feeding is continuing to go well, and his tone in his chest and airway is continuing to improve, he'll take him completely off oxygen. All and all, a very good report. Gabe clapped as the doc was telling us the news...I gues he approves of the plan too.