opus 360 modification

[DreamStalker]

Early on in my treatment I radically modified a Breeze nasal pillow interface by cutting off the metal spine and rigging it up to a soft headgear. It worked great for over a year maintaining my AHI under 0.5 fairly consistently.

Then last year, the Opus came out and showed great promise but the pillow design was flawed IMO (they collapsed and leaked profusely). F&P must have realized it too because within about 6 months they came out with the much improved Opus 360. However the side strap was a little thick and caused the pillows to shift a bit when sleeping on my side. So I came up with a fix to improve the stability to keep the pillows stabilized under the nares regardless of what sleep position I happened to be in and it worked really well for me (see pics below).





Basically, I cut a slot in the plastic part of the side strap near the pillows and then filed it smooth with a finger nail file. Then I used the slot to slip the stretchy halo straps from the Breeze mask and run them lower around to the back and beneath the ear changing the tensional forces to stabilize the pillows under the nares.

I abandoned my Breeze mask and thought I had found a new favorite mask interface. Ha! Right after I came up with the Opus 360 fix (within a month), the Swift LT came out and I tried it and it was the first mask that fit me right out of the box like it was custom designed specially for me.

Anyway, two years ago today I found this wonderful forum that helped me to get my life back and quite possibly extend my life by a decade or two. Now I have the perfect mask and the perfect settings on my perfect machine and I just don't think it can get any better than consistent AHI of less than 0.3. Everyone is different and every mask fits each of us differently. Therefore, the journey to find that perfect mask is not always quick, easy, or cheap. I wish to thank everyone on the forum who has helped me along my journey and continue to help others.

So I would like to give my modified Opus 360 to a forum member who continues to struggle in their search for the perfect mask. It has large pillows only so if you know you need small or medium, you will need to make that extra effort to get them on your own. I'll ship it out to the first to PM me with an address in lower 48 states (sorry but I hope others outside of US do not take offense ... nothing personal). For those who are not first with the PM, This modification is quite easy and maybe it will help you?

EDIT: A crazy paper just claimed it ... but like I said, you can easily do the mod yourself if you get a hold of an Opus.

[JeffH]

What I want to know is where is everybody on this forum getting all the heads? Damn it, I want a head too!

Good job Roberto and thanks for the help you have been to me on this forum.



JeffH

[rested gal]

Ya done good, Roberto! You already earned a Lab Rat Trophy for your work with the Breeze. Here's a plaque for your continued cool lab ratting...now with the Opus 360.



Your mod has been added to the links here:

LINKS to Lab Rat Trophy awards
viewtopic.php?t=15104

[DreamStalker]

Thanks Laura for the trohpy and all the help you have given me and everyone else on this forum.

No more lab ratting for me though, ResMed finally made a mask for people like me. Only thing they could improve upon the Swift LT would be to replace the 360 elbow swivel with the 360 ball-socket swivel like the Opus has.

Again, thanks Rested Gal, you are the Mother Teresa of CPAP