Help Please

I have been using CPAP for almost 6 months. I have the Quattro Air mask and it doesn't seem to get along with me. I wake up most mornings with a sore and/or bruised nose bridge as well as an extremely dry mouth (due to allergies, I need a FFM). I have tried the Padacheek liner and then I get crazy leaks. I had called my DME about a month after I got it (I had not been made aware of the 30 day trial window until this phone call) and they basically told me I was out of luck since I wouldn't be able to get there to get a different mask until out of this window. Any suggestions? I am ready to just order my own mask if my DME won't let me come in and try a different mask (no matter what I have to buy it myself since I haven't met my deductible for this year).

** Note: my humidifier is set to max.

I can't help with a specific FFM because I don't use them but since you are going to be buying out of pocket check out cpap.com and the full face masks there and consider purchasing the 30 day return insurance that is available.
That way you can at least recoup part of the expense if a mask doesn't work out.
Some masks have free return insurance so that's a no brainer but don't know if any of the full face masks have that available.

This FFM does for sure have free return insurance.
https://www.cpap.com/productpage/resmed ... dgear.html

njean wrote:I have been using CPAP for almost 6 months. I have the Quattro Air mask and it doesn't seem to get along with me. I wake up most mornings with a sore and/or bruised nose bridge as well as an extremely dry mouth (due to allergies, I need a FFM). I have tried the Padacheek liner and then I get crazy leaks. I had called my DME about a month after I got it (I had not been made aware of the 30 day trial window until this phone call) and they basically told me I was out of luck since I wouldn't be able to get there to get a different mask until out of this window. Any suggestions? I am ready to just order my own mask if my DME won't let me come in and try a different mask (no matter what I have to buy it myself since I haven't met my deductible for this year).

** Note: my humidifier is set to max.

My suspicion is that the high humidity is causing nasal congestion and forcing you to mouth-breathe......which causes "dry mouth". Try turning your HH setting down or off and see what happens.

If your mask is properly sized and adjusted it should cause NO sores or bruising!
The more you tighten them, the worse they may leak and possibly "hurt" you.


Den

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njean, you can also try the masks made out of cloth. I use one and have great results from it.

At the lower humidity levels, the dry mouth is worse (like wake up and have absolutely no moisture in my mouth or throat at all). The higher humidity at least leaves a tiny bit of moisture in my mouth.

njean wrote:At the lower humidity levels, the dry mouth is worse (like wake up and have absolutely no moisture in my mouth or throat at all). The higher humidity at least leaves a tiny bit of moisture in my mouth.

So, apparently you're mouth-breathing.......for whatever reason (allergies, etc.).
Can you breathe through your nose at all? (like other than when you're hooked up to the CPAP)

Next, it would help if you would post ALL of your machine settings.


Den

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Extensive mouth breathing even while using a FFM can still lead to dry mouth problems. Even at its maximum setting, the humidifier is not really designed to keep the mouth dry if a significant amount of moving air is going through the mouth for long periods of time. You should be sure to keep yourself well hydrated during the daytime. And you may find using something like Biotene mouthwash useful.

But an important question is whether it's possible for you to breathe through your nose most of the time when you are asleep.

You say you must use a FFM due to allergies. Are you a habitual mouth breather even in the daytime? And how bad are the daytime allergy problems as opposed to the nighttime problems?

Properly treating the allergies may be the best way of tackling this problem because that may allow you to breathe more through your nose and less through your mouth. So ...

What are the main allergy symptoms? Nasal congestion? Or more than just nasal congestion?

What are your known allergens? Mainly airborne---i.e. things like pollen? Do you suffer from allergies all year long?

For routine seasonal allergies to pollen and many dust/pet dander allergies, the filtered CPAP air often helps make it easier to breathe at night because you can put a fine filter on the machine, and many of the fine filters are capable of filtering out many common airborne allergens. But it helps tremendously if you can breathe through your nose before you put the PAP mask on.

So that brings up: How do you usually treat your allergy symptoms? Do you typically just ignore them and hope for the best? Or do you have some kind of treatment plan?

When I was a newbie, I found that I had to pay a lot more attention to properly treating my nasal allergies in order to be able to comfortably use my PAP machine. (And I use nasal pillows masks even when my allergies are at their worst.) When my allergies are acting up, I find that if I go ahead and take a daily antihistamine (like zyrtex or allegra or claritin) that helps a lot. What helps even more is using a neti pot an hour or so before bedtime. And at one point when the allergies were really acting up, I was prescribed Flonase, which also helped a lot in making it possible for me to breathe through my nose at night. An added bonus to getting serious about dealing with my allergy-driven night time nasal congestion so I could use my PAP was that I started having significantly fewer daytime allergy symptoms. And I noticed that treating my allergies let me feel better in the daytime as well as at night than my old habit of simply suffering through them because my allergies are "mild to moderate" instead of "severe."