ResMed H4I Hummidifier question

[AdamsHouseCat]

Hello-

My first post here.

I am a new user of ResMed S8 Elite II with H4I humidifier, and have a question about the humidifier, as I have never used one before.

The instructions indicate I should pour out any remaining / leftover distilled water from the tank each morning.

Trying to be practical about things, should I really find this to be necessary?

Thanks for any advice.

[ched03]

I DON'T pour mine out every morning. I just refill it to the line use it the next night. I do however, discard what is left every weekend and follow the cleaning instructions in the manual. I have been using mine for 8 months now and have not had a problem. My tank still looks like new!

[chunkyfrog]

I MEANT to do that, . . .
But it just didn't happen for about 4 months, when I discovered a little round island of white mold floating in the tank.
I cleaned it -as well as you can for the 'standard' H5i tank; and asked my doctor for a RX for the cleanable tank.
I really like it, and hubby has already ordered his cleanable tank.
I suspect that it's NOT covered by BCBSNE; rotten invertebrates!

[HoseCrusher]

Warm water can breed a lot of things. The air from the machine is filtered, so the amount of crap in the air is greatly reduced. We basically breath crap all day, so it probably doesn't hurt to subject yourself to the possibility of breathing a little bit of crap during the night.

I find I get a psychological lift from cleaning my tank out every day and filling the tank with fresh water each night. It is not enough of a lift to say that my xPAP experience is pleasurable, but I look forward to the fact that when hooked up I have a good chance of breathing air that may be a little purer than what I breath during the rest of the day.

The body can handle breathing crap very well and few people have problems with that. My thought is that if I can reduce stress a little while I sleep, I may improve the quality of my sleep.

To minimize wastage, fill the tank up and use it during a "typical" night. Measure the amount of water you use to fill it back up. Next time just put the measured amount of water in the tank and, depending upon room conditions, you will be using most of that up each night. My settings are such that I use a little less than about half a tank each night. I fill the tank half full and have very little to toss in the morning.

[xenablue]

I'm a total newbie, but when I met with the technician to be fitted for my CPAP, he said I could re-use the same distilled water, but just empty it into another clean container before emptying the humidifier tank, cleaning and leaving out to dry all day. Not sure I'd do this for more than a few days, and distilled water is pretty cheap - so far I've used 'new' water every day, but I'm a bit of a germophobe.
I didn't have distilled water for the first couple of nights, and tech said boiled water is OK every now and then.

Cheers,
Xena

[ched03]

While boiling water may take care of the germ problem, it isn't going to do a darn thing about the minerals in the water if you have hard water. I live in San Antonio and here if you use regular tap water in anything you want to last/use for a long time, I would make those occasions few and far between.

[Sheriff Buford]

I have the same humidifier. It didn't work when I brought it home, so I finally got a new one. When the man brought the new one out, he said to empty it, use "new" distilled water every night and leave the tank out every day to dry. I only use the humidifier when I am "stuffy". Hope this helps.

Sheriff

[Duckie]

I empty mine every morning but since I do daily sinus rinses I use the water that is left for that.

[ched03]

Why should I empty out my water chamber every morning? Do you think that the water is getting contaminated? You don't think that cleaning it out weekly with distilled vinegar is good enough? I really want to know this. I am trying to establish a good cleaning routine for my parts and would like to do what is right. Thanks!

[kbobtn]

I top mine off every night with fresh distilled water, and rinse it only when I see any crud floating around. Been doing this for a little over a year, so far. I started washing it out weekly as directed, and using fresh water every night, but quickly lost interest.

[rested gal]

I rarely (once or twice a year) dump the water out. I just add more distilled water each night. Been doing it that way for years. Doesn't make my way "right" for everyone, of course. Works for me.

Additional interesting discussions:

Cleaning CPAP Equipment
topic started by forumadmin - April 2005
viewtopic.php?p=18245#p18245

More-Sterile/Easier-Cleaning Process?
topic started by bozmon - February 2005
viewtopic.php?p=7811#p7811

Cleaned my mask now it leaks
topic started by gerrys - June 2007
viewtopic.php?p=184829#p184829

Cleaning water tank
topic started by seernst - June 2008
viewtopic.php?p=275976#p275976

Weekly Mask Cleaning---OverKill ???
topic started by DannyP - August 2008
viewtopic.php?p=293520#p293520

THE HOSE - TO DISINFECT OR NOT TO DISINFECT ?
topic started by Marietjie - March 2009
viewtopic.php?p=352004#p352004

How often do you clean your hose?
topic started by Juliebove - April 2009
viewtopic.php?p=361594#p361594

Poll: How Often Do You Clean Your Tank?
poll started by NeedSomeAir - September 2009
viewtopic.php?p=405431#p405431

[HoseCrusher]

Ched03,

The rate of crap growing in your humidifier depends upon how contaminated your air is, and how well your machine filters the crap out of the air. Since you are using distilled water, the growth rate should be slower, but biofilm grows in distilled water too.

I would guess that you would be good for a few days, but that is just a wild guess. The best way to check is to run your finger along the inside of the humidifier. If you detect some slippery stuff, you have biofilm growing.

Keep in mind that just because you have biofilm growing on the surface of your humidifier does not mean that you are breathing this crap in. However, I am not aware of any tests that show that you aren't.

The body is pretty good at filtering this crap out, so I don't think it is much of an issue. Still, to be sure it would be a good idea to empty the tank each day and put fresh water in each night.