Mold in water chamber...what the heck?

[danneves7]

I found mold in my water chamber tonight for my Philips Respironics machine and I clean my mask once a week I clean my tubing once a month but I guess I forgot to clean the chamber for god knows how long and I've been having a breathing issues lately and I've been coughing hacking up yellow stuff I think it may have been caused by the mold in my chamber, needless to say I'll be cleaning the chamber weekly now and inspecting it for mold on a regular basis because that was horrible. Does anybody know the exact cleaning protocols for our machines in terms of how regularly we should clean them and what with and how to do it cetera et cetera???

[RogerSC]

Generally speaking, I would take a look at your owner's manual and see what it says about maintenance, and use that as a starting point. For my cpap, ResMed suggests washing out the water tank every day with warm water and a "mild" detergent. I tend to wash it every week (on the weekend), or when I see anything in the tank when I empty it out daily. I like the tank to dry out around here, since I live in mold/mildew central, so I pour the water out in the morning, and it's dry for a good part of the day until I add distilled water when I get ready to go to bed at night.

I think that you need to use your own judgement on this to some degree, but washing your water tank out once a week doesn't take much time and is a good thing in my opinion. It also makes a difference where you live...I live right by the ocean, so the moisture here provides a nice home for mold and mildew. If I lived in the desert, I'd probably feel differently *smile*.

[Julie]

Are you using distilled water or ??

[danneves7]

Generally speaking, I would take a look at your owner's manual and see what it says about maintenance, and use that as a starting point. For my cpap, ResMed suggests washing out the water tank every day with warm water and a "mild" detergent. I tend to wash it every week (on the weekend), or when I see anything in the tank when I empty it out daily. I like the tank to dry out around here, since I live in mold/mildew central, so I pour the water out in the morning, and it's dry for a good part of the day until I add distilled water when I get ready to go to bed at night.

I think that you need to use your own judgement on this to some degree, but washing your water tank out once a week doesn't take much time and is a good thing in my opinion. It also makes a difference where you live...I live right by the ocean, so the moisture here provides a nice home for mold and mildew. If I lived in the desert, I'd probably feel differently *smile*.

Roger that. No pun intended

[danneves7]

Are you using distilled water or ??

Distilled but I never empty the chamber, should I empty and dry daily??

[Julie]

Maybe not daily, but weekly, with a little vinegar and/or mild detergent.

[msla]

This link has a nice discussion on biofilms. When you clean the chamber, this is the slickness you feel scrubbing the metal tub.

https://www.biofilm.montana.edu/biofilm ... ion-1.html

[Sir NoddinOff]

Mold can be hard to eliminate completely because the spores can get into microscopic cracks and crevices where cleaning solutions can't be effective... I suggest buying a new tank. They aren't that expensive. Once you get a new tank clean it with Control III once a week at least. Use Control III in diluted form as the back of the bottle recommends. When dilluted you only need enough to wet the surfaces for an hour or so, you don't need to fill the tank up all the way, an ounce or two will do fine:

https://www.cpap.com/productpage/Contro ... eaner.html

[Too tall]

Just soak the whole thing in water with enough clorox to kill the mole and you'll be in good shape. I know there are those who will disagree with the use of chlorine but I'd rather breath clean air than mole or whatever. I don't use vinegar, hate it. I don't use the humidifier either. Try without it. Your maintenance will go nearly to 0.

[RogerSC]

Mold can be hard to eliminate completely because the spores can get into microscopic cracks and crevices where cleaning solutions can't be effective... I suggest buying a new tank. They aren't that expensive. Once you get a new tank clean it with Control III once a week at least. Use Control III in diluted form as the back of the bottle recommends. When dilluted you only need enough to wet the surfaces for an hour or so, you don't need to fill the tank up all the way, an ounce or two will do fine:

https://www.cpap.com/productpage/Contro ... eaner.html

Hey, I've bought new wood with termites, why not a new water tank that comes with a little mold in those microscopic cracks and crevices? I use a small, soft brush when I wash my tank in hopes that I get the stuff that's reproduced enough to be a problem *smile*. Gets into those non-microscopic corners and surface intersections. From what I can see, nothing is left...of course, I don't get out a microscope...at a certain level I just don't want to know.

[Gasper62]

I like to have a goldfish in my humidifier, it keeps the mosquito breeding to a minimum. I clean mine using a quick spritz of a 200ppm Clorox solution followed by repeated hot water rinsing .(3/4 teaspoon per quart water) That seems to make it clean and I never have any trace of chlorine odor left.FWIW, any "dishwasher safe" reservoir is likely to be exposed to chlorine as that's what most DW detergents have as an ingredient. YMMV

[Wulfman...]

I found mold in my water chamber tonight for my Philips Respironics machine and I clean my mask once a week I clean my tubing once a month but I guess I forgot to clean the chamber for god knows how long and I've been having a breathing issues lately and I've been coughing hacking up yellow stuff I think it may have been caused by the mold in my chamber, needless to say I'll be cleaning the chamber weekly now and inspecting it for mold on a regular basis because that was horrible. Does anybody know the exact cleaning protocols for our machines in terms of how regularly we should clean them and what with and how to do it cetera et cetera???

Yep. I (and most of us) know what the manufacturers recommend......but I don't follow the recommendations that strictly. I dump and rinse my HH tank about every three months when I start a new gallon of distilled (I don't use heated humidity). I've only taken my original HH tank apart ONCE to actually "clean" it and that was in early 2012. Some of the other spare tanks I received with some "previously owned" machines I bought were taken apart and cleaned when I got them. But, I DO visually inspect the tank and the water in it just about every night before I crawl in bed......and add water every couple of nights. There's nothing in there that can get sent up the hose to me during the night because the water molecules are too small to carry anything out of the tank.
And, I've used distilled water almost exclusively except a couple of occasions when I forgot to take some along on a road trip, so I used some Brita filtered water until I could get to a store to buy a gallon.

But.......how is it YOU "forgot" for so long? Do you ever clean/replace your intake filters? They do a lot in keeping stuff out of the machine and HH tank.

I seriously doubt that the "mold" you found in your HH tank had anything to do with your "breathing issues" you've had because we have more contact with "germs" when we're not using our machines. However, YOU are the one who hadn't been checking or cleaning YOUR machine.......and now YOU are "preaching" to US (in the other thread you started) about how WE should be cleaning our machines. Really???


Den

.

[danneves7]

Mold can be hard to eliminate completely because the spores can get into microscopic cracks and crevices where cleaning solutions can't be effective... I suggest buying a new tank. They aren't that expensive. Once you get a new tank clean it with Control III once a week at least. Use Control III in diluted form as the back of the bottle recommends. When dilluted you only need enough to wet the surfaces for an hour or so, you don't need to fill the tank up all the way, an ounce or two will do fine:

https://www.cpap.com/productpage/Contro ... eaner.html

Thank u

[danneves7]

I found mold in my water chamber tonight for my Philips Respironics machine and I clean my mask once a week I clean my tubing once a month but I guess I forgot to clean the chamber for god knows how long and I've been having a breathing issues lately and I've been coughing hacking up yellow stuff I think it may have been caused by the mold in my chamber, needless to say I'll be cleaning the chamber weekly now and inspecting it for mold on a regular basis because that was horrible. Does anybody know the exact cleaning protocols for our machines in terms of how regularly we should clean them and what with and how to do it cetera et cetera???

Yep. I (and most of us) know what the manufacturers recommend......but I don't follow the recommendations that strictly. I dump and rinse my HH tank about every three months when I start a new gallon of distilled (I don't use heated humidity). I've only taken my original HH tank apart ONCE to actually "clean" it and that was in early 2012. Some of the other spare tanks I received with some "previously owned" machines I bought were taken apart and cleaned when I got them. But, I DO visually inspect the tank and the water in it just about every night before I crawl in bed......and add water every couple of nights. There's nothing in there that can get sent up the hose to me during the night because the water molecules are too small to carry anything out of the tank.
And, I've used distilled water almost exclusively except a couple of occasions when I forgot to take some along on a road trip, so I used some Brita filtered water until I could get to a store to buy a gallon.

But.......how is it YOU "forgot" for so long? Do you ever clean/replace your intake filters? They do a lot in keeping stuff out of the machine and HH tank.

I seriously doubt that the "mold" you found in your HH tank had anything to do with your "breathing issues" you've had because we have more contact with "germs" when we're not using our machines. However, YOU are the one who hadn't been checking or cleaning YOUR machine.......and now YOU are "preaching" to US (in the other thread you started) about how WE should be cleaning our machines. Really???


Den

.

Not preaching just sharing info I found lol

[archangle]

New tanks are pretty cheap from cpap.com or other online sellers. Get one just so you'll have a spare. Most insurance will pay for a new tank every 6 months.

Clean your moldy tank thoroughly right now. Philips Respironics tanks all seem to be dishwashable.

Once you get the spare tank, boil a big pot of water, turn off the heat and drop the the disassembled old tank in and let it sit until the water is cool. It's worked OK for me with Respironics tanks, but wait until you have a spare, just in case they've changed something.

Note that some of the ResMed non-dishwashable tanks will melt.

Even with distilled water, there's still some contamination in the water. As the water evaporates, it concentrates the contaminants. There's also some amount of dust in the air that makes it through the filters, and that gets concentrated as the water evaporates.

Dumping the water every morning and refilling at night is the safest thing. I use distilled water and dump and dishwash once a week. I have two tanks and clean the one I'm using each week, and let it sit dry for the next week while I use the other tank.

In my opinion, Control III is overkill for normal usage, but it's good if you get a used tank, or if you have some nasty incident such as yours. I'd still do the boiling water trick since I know heat will get down into all the cracks and crevices.

In theory, germs in the water tank won't get into the air, but keep it clean anyway.