noisy mouth sounds but no leaking

Hello, my wife has fixed pressure machine and nasal pillow. It has worked beautifully for three years but we now struggle with what appears to be leaking from the mouth. Tape or no tape there is the gushing sound and when I check there doesn't appear to be any obvious air escape. It is noisy within her mouth. We have just upped pressure to 7 but this made it worse and left her with her worst ap score in three years. Does anyone know if it could be that he pressure needs to come down. A chin strap helps mostly but not always and she hates wearing it. Any help would be good.

mitch

This is why they make full face masks. Jim

Sounds like the tongue has relaxed its vigilant state where it had been blocking the opening into the mouth and allowing the air to enter the mouth instead of proceeding on down the airway.

If the mouth is staying closed..no pressure is being lost but the cheeks can poof out (chipmunk cheek) and it sure can be annoying.

Evaluate the leak line to see if there is enough "leaking" from the mouth to impair therapy. Just because you don't catch it doesn't mean it doesn't happen. Even if leaking isn't enough to show up on the leak line report as a large leak if it is waking her up...it needs to be fixed because anything that disturbs sleep is unwanted.

And yes..increasing the pressure just puts more air into the mouth to make things worse.

If mouth leaking is large...need a full face mask or figure out some way to keep the tongue in position (easier said than done while we are asleep). If it is minor and not waking her up then don't worry about it. You do need to evaluate leak per the reports though and not rely on your seeing it unless you don't sleep at all and can watch her closely to document no air exiting the open mouth even if it is small.

I believe the SleepStyle 244 does have data available. Unsure what is on the screen but it will work with the Performance Maximizer software and if you don't have the software your DME should have it.

mitchinaus wrote:Hello, my wife has fixed pressure machine and nasal pillow. It has worked beautifully for three years but we now struggle with what appears to be leaking from the mouth. Tape or no tape there is the gushing sound and when I check there doesn't appear to be any obvious air escape. It is noisy within her mouth. We have just upped pressure to 7 but this made it worse and left her with her worst ap score in three years. Does anyone know if it could be that he pressure needs to come down. A chin strap helps mostly but not always and she hates wearing it. Any help would be good.

mitch

It's not the pressure...a pressure of 6-7 is VERY LOW. She needs a Full Face Mask if she is mouth breathing.

Thanks for replies, we had a better night last night. I am wearing ear plugs though but by all reports she feels it was a good night. Will check data to see what leaking is really going on. I note in other posts a theme about approaching this all very calmly and logically, easier said than done sometimes

Mitch