SoClean of nasal pillows

[Jmchap1]

I use a SoClean 2 for my Dreamstation CPAP machine. Can I put all my nasal pillows in the SoClean machine?

[Pugsy]

Can you? Sure you can...you "can" put anything you want in the SoClean that you can fit in.
Should you? Now that is a totally different question.

https://www.verywellhealth.com/do-you-n ... in-4171650

https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-a ... one-gas-or

https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality- ... r-cleaners

https://www.resmed.com/us/dam/documents ... letter.pdf
Respironics has a similar statement somewhere I didn't save the link to it

just to start with...there numerous other reasons.

Me...I wouldn't have one in my house if it were free much less use it. Ozone is a poisonous gas....

It will shorten the life of your machine, your nasal pillows and maybe your own lungs. But it's your choice.

[zonker]

popcorn.gif (73.9 KiB) Viewed 3375 times

[chunkyfrog]

Damn!
You made me go look for the microwave pork rinds--low carb. Yum.

[zonker]

Damn!
You made me go look for the microwave pork rinds--low carb. Yum.

damn!
now i have to go find a gif of a giraffe eating microwave pork rinds.

[chunkyfrog]

My share is all gone now--saved some for the bullfrog.

[roadcycler]

OK Zonker I will share with you

[zonker]

OK Zonker I will share with you

ah!

most kind of you!!

[fdeihle]

Can you? Sure you can...you "can" put anything you want in the SoClean that you can fit in.
Should you? Now that is a totally different question.

https://www.verywellhealth.com/do-you-n ... in-4171650

https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-a ... one-gas-or

https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality- ... r-cleaners

https://www.resmed.com/us/dam/documents ... letter.pdf
Respironics has a similar statement somewhere I didn't save the link to it

just to start with...there numerous other reasons.

Me...I wouldn't have one in my house if it were free much less use it. Ozone is a poisonous gas....

It will shorten the life of your machine, your nasal pillows and maybe your own lungs. But it's your choice.

Pugsy,

Thank you so much for these articles and the advice!

I recently was trying to find a way to get better at cleaning my CPAP equipment since I don't always make time to clean it weekly like I should. So I thought, why not finally look into a CPAP cleaner, like SoClean, that are so heavily advertised by my healthcare DME company, so I can actually stick to the recommended cleaning schedule. Boy was I disappointed!

Not only are many of these cleaners really expensive, upwards of $100 sometimes with filters ranging $30 that need to be replaced regularly, but they can be even be harmful to your health!

During my research I also found out the FDA has received complaints of respiratory problems from the ozone expelled from the machine...ozone is a harmful chemical and shouldn't be accumulating in your room! There's no medical use for ozone according to the FDA (acc to your Healthline article). Plus, the FDA hasn't approved any of these machines! There's been little to no studies on whether these machines work! (https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-a ... one-gas-or)

Then I saw your post giving a link to a Healthline article discouraging them, and I made up my mind not to think about them again. Thank you!

That companies (even DME-affiliated ones that cell CPAPs) can be willing to make a hefty sum off a product that has little evidence to it and likely actually harms vulnerable patients is extremely disappointing but not surprising. I've seen this sort of thing from some companies time and time again--but you gotta stay positive or you'll just become a misanthrope and wanna live on an island somewhere. I just hope others look at the evidence before putting their health at risk, especially us who have OSA/CSA!

Thanks again for helping save me from throwing my mullah down the toilet!

Felipe

[chunkyfrog]

Cleaning is easy, and often OPTIONAL.
Hot water and Dawn, or unscented baby wipes do more than that over-priced poison-spewer.
The so called "so clean" does NOT clean anthing but wallets of their filthy money.
[[[I also use a water pic on the mesh vents of my p10 masks.]]]
Messy, but fun!
My dentist prefers I use it in my mouth . . .

[Pugsy]

so I can actually stick to the recommended cleaning schedule.

The thing that annoys me about these various "cleaning" products is they don't clean anything. To my mind cleaning involves removing snot, slobber, facial oils, dirt, grime...etc. None of these products actually will remove anything...they just nuke the snot, slobber, facial oils, dirt, grime etc (assuming they even do that) and maybe you end up with sterile snot, slobber, etc. They all still tell you that you have to wash your mask first and low and behold they want to sell you one of their "cleaning" products to use before you nuke your equipment. Kind of defeats the purpose in my book. Cleaning and sanitizing are 2 different things to me and that's assuming anything gets sanitized or nuked and made sterile.

When I used a nasal pillow mask I didn't clean (soap and water wash) them unless I had a drippy nose. The "recommended" cleaning schedule for any of this cpap stuff is overkill IMHO. I never wash my hose...when I used nasal pillows I washed them maybe once a month. The water chamber got washed whenever I thought about it (which wasn't very often) but maybe every 2 or 3 months.
The more you mess with stuff the more you risk tearing something up and the DME gets to sell you something new. They want you to tear stuff up or replace stuff as often as possible.

Now if I had a bad cold or the flu...once the symptoms were gone I would do a thorough cleaning of the mask. Mainly for the yuck factor thing.

A lot of people just wipe their masks down with something like a baby wipe or even just a little alcohol swab to remove the facial oils.
Figure out what you are comfortable with and adapt your own cleaning schedule and be happy with it. A lot will depend on which mask a person uses and how oily their skin is and maybe if they get a drippy nose from allergies or drool inside a full face mask but the schedule recommended by DMEs......IMHO just simply overkill.

You are the only person you have to make happy so you get to decide how you want to handle it.
Me...I was religious about the once a week cleaning for about 6 months then that got old real fast and I got lazy and I shelved that idea real fast. It's been over 11 years now and it hasn't killed me yet and the only time I have got sick was when hubby brings home a cold.
Then I wash things to get rid of the excess snot. I wash my stuff otherwise only when I happen to think about it which isn't very often. The only time I have washed a hose was to check it for leaks after I caught the cat playing with it.

[fdeihle]

Cleaning is easy, and often OPTIONAL.
Hot water and Dawn, or unscented baby wipes do more than that over-priced poison-spewer.
The so called "so clean" does NOT clean anthing but wallets of their filthy money.
[[[I also use a water pic on the mesh vents of my p10 masks.]]]
Messy, but fun!
My dentist prefers I use it in my mouth . . .

Chunkyfrog, I like your sense of humor! Why not make cleaning fun?

I agree that these ozone machines also don't really clean all those facial oils and grime off, they are only advertised as killing bacteria or germs, not cleaning all the gross stuff. With regard to the recommended cleaning schedule thing, id rather not risk an infection if possible. It does depend on the mask and your facial oil amount, as well as your area's humidity for the type of microbes you get, and apparently some studies don't show a huge difference in infection rates between CPAP and non-CPAP users. But then again, if you can minimize the risk with a little cleaning and keep a nice fresh mask, in my opinion, it's probably worth it. I do wish there was better data on it though, since that Healthline article above doesn't give a whole lot of evidence.

[chunkyfrog]

. . .
advertised as killing bacteria or germs . . .

---and it doesn't even do that better than plain old soap and water.

[palerider]

I do wish there was better data on it though, since that Healthline article above doesn't give a whole lot of evidence.

So you're going to believe the scare marketing of the people trying to scam you out of money?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5611769/

The bacteria on your cpap mask *come from you*.