Irritated Nares with Airfit P10 for her

Hi,

I'm an absolute noob, last night was night 2 on CPAP. First of all, thanks to everyone; I was lurking around here before I started treatment to help answer my dizzying number of questions and to help ease my fears of starting. That said, I feel a little silly asking--I know this topic has been brought up several times--but does anyone have suggestions for irritated nares? Is this something I just need to "suck it up" and it'll normalize on it's own?

I've been waking up in the early hours of the morning and taking my mask off. I'm not going to dramatize it and call it pain, it's more of an irritation--it started on day one as an itchy nose (the outside of my nares and the skin/flesh area between the nostrils); last night it feels like when I blow my nose in a tissue too much and it becomes irritated on the outer skin. Today, the skin is sore to the touch but otherwise okay. I am totally guessing but since the inside of my nose feels fine, I suspect that means my humidity settings are ok. When I'm awake, I usually have a high pain tolerance so that's why this feels like a silly question. I'm getting a fair amount of use time in (6-7 hours) but I'm trying to eliminate wake ups.

I'm going to check Walmart today for some lansinoh, the grocery store didn't have any.

My machine has a heated tube, the temp is set to 70 and humidifier set to 4. I'm using a Resmed Airsense 10 and a Airfit P10 for her nasal pillow. I tried a larger nasal pillow size and loosening the straps by pushing the head gear closer to the base of my neck last night. One thing I'm dealing with is wrangling the hose in a way that it's not tugging my mask--maybe that has something to do with outside irritation? DME wanted me to give it a good week long effort before switching masks. I like the P10 aside from the wake ups from irritation. Aside from the little bit of nose irritation, I'm happy with how my treatment is going so far.

yoshi wrote:One thing I'm dealing with is wrangling the hose in a way that it's not tugging my mask--maybe that has something to do with outside irritation?

Yup, you got that figured out.

- Observe how the hose runs from the machine to the mask. Manage your hose in such a way that it does not pull on the mask when you move in the bed. You need some slack in the hose. Check when you bed down that the slack is there.

- Watch the manufacturer's videos on how to adjust the mask headgear. There is a medium range, not too loose and not too tight, that needs to be achieved. Many of the manufacturer's adjustment instructions can be found at youtube.com and cpap.com.

- Do use a small amount of Lansinoh lanolin on irritated areas - http://www.target.com/p/lansinoh-hpa-la ... m=lansinoh

- Observe how the hose runs from the machine to the mask. Manage your hose in such a way that it does not pull on the mask when you move in the bed. You need some slack in the hose. Check when you bed down that the slack is there.

Thanks ChicagoGranny. I made a Walmart run and put on my thinking cap to how I can do some sort of hose management. Found some Command Strip hooks for cord management like this one: http://www.containerstore.com/catalogim ... dler_x.jpg and got some Lansinoh for the nares. Hopefully the command strip does the trick but I have some other creative ideas for rigging it if it needs to come away from the wall a bit. My bed is an adjustable kind without a headboard, so I was looking for a quick solution until I order a more permanent hose management solution. Anyway, thank you for the suggestions.

Lots of hose guidance systems around. Mine is home-made.
Swivel plant hanger screwed to the wall; broken fishing pole duck taped to that.
Assorted scrunchies hung from the line guides. Works lots better than it looks.
Note: When I first saw the title, I thought it said "Irritated NURSES"!

Lots of hose guidance systems around. Mine is home-made.
Swivel plant hanger screwed to the wall; broken fishing pole duck taped to that.
Assorted scrunchies hung from the line guides. Works lots better than it looks.
Note: When I first saw the title, I thought it said "Irritated NURSES"!

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who misreads things. Sometimes they are pretty entertaining though, so I won't wish that "quirk" away.

Do you happen to have a picture for reference? I think what I have in my head if the command loops don't work, may be similar... Optimally I want to find a solution that's not too terrible to look at, but at this point I'm happy to use whatever works. I'm just extremely happy to finally have some relief from months of what I call "puke tired", so I'm not going to get too choosy... yet.

Like I suggested, my system is NOT pretty, and I have no image, but
some day, I want a pretty curved valance attached to the wall, with swags where I can clip scrunchies.

If you go poking through these old threads for various DIY hose management systems you may find some pictures to help you out.
viewtopic.php?t=10640

yoshi wrote:Found some Command Strip hooks for cord management

If you need something like that, by all means use it.

At some point, think about what you are going to do when you are away from home. On the road, you are going to want good therapy.

Personally, I did not want hose management hardware to carry with me when traveling. I figured out the hose could be run from the machine to about my solar plexus and then up to the mask. The hose lies on my chest and I put a little ess curve in it. This give me some slack for when I move or roll to one side. That's just something to think about long term. For now, get a good therapy whatever it takes.

Have you tried moving the top strap to the top of your head to reduce pressure and keep the bottom strap low on your neck? About a 90 degree angle between them...

ChicagoGranny posted a nice link about adjusting the headgear. My DME told me that straps further apart was tighter but the video said looser. So to clarify this confusion, I decided to do another "experiment"... (okay it wasn't an experiment as much as it was for catching up on sleep... ) Anyway, I used my command strips that I got at Walmart earlier today, put on some Lansinoh, and adjusted the headgear so the straps were like you said 90 degrees apart... then I took an amazing 1 hour nap. My nares feel so much better with this setup.

I started to look at the tube management thread for ideas on something for travel--thanks for the link pugsy! It's amazing the creativity out there, almost to the point of overwhelm. But I think I might have a easy and portable solution. So I'll test my ideas when I get some supplies. I think my issue with tubing was fighting gravity and tubes getting wrapped around me.

Thanks everyone for the kind input!

yoshi wrote:adjusted the headgear so the straps were like you said 90 degrees apart

Is that consistent with what the manufacturer's video recommended?

I don't want to be recommending those videos if they are not the best techniques.

yoshi wrote:then I took an amazing 1 hour nap.

Is that consistent with what the manufacturer's video recommended?

In my humble opinion, it seems to be. The only thing looser (to me) is if both straps are at the base of my neck, which makes me worry if the mask would stay on at all. I was doing a smaller angle on night 1 and 2, probably more like a 45 degree and it was smooshing the xsmall pillows pretty deep into my nostril.

yoshi wrote:smooshing the xsmall pillows pretty deep into my nostril.

Are you sure the xs pillows are large enough? They should not go into your nostrils. It's true that the very tips of the pillows extend slightly into the nostrils. But, the flange on the pillows should seal on the outside of your nares.

I'm positive the Xsmall was too small. DME said the xsmall looked better because it wasnt stretching my nostrils, so thats what I used on night 1. Night 2 I up sized to small. Last night with my tube management, headgear adjustments, and lansinoh I had an amazing nights rest. I'm thinking I must have done something right!

I had a small panic when I woke up. It felt like I deep slept for a REALLY long time, it was still dark out too...so I had to check both the date and time. Phew, I didnt sleep till monday! Now I've got to figure out a new, awesome problem to have: what to do with the extra am energy. Lol. I'm sure I'll manage though. Thanks again ChicagoGranny!

Remember, the person at the DME is often just a salesperson,
armed with only enough training to do the paperwork and directions to "push" the high markup stuff.
Some have no idea how to fit a mask, and will cram pillows all the way into your nares if given a chance.
Look closely at your nasal pillows. The stiff rim at the base of the soft cone goes OUTSIDE.
I think of the pillow as a little saddle, and the rim as the cantle--you do NOT sit on the cantle.