help with hybrid masks

[hegel]

I didn't know about hybrid masks until a few days ago. I recently pre-ordered the Amara mask because I was curious about having a mouth covering after all these years with Swift nasal pillows. Now I see that there are two models of hybrid masks that answer this same issue while being perhaps less intrusive than the Amara; also, they use nasal pillows, which work for me. I can return the Amara for free if it doesn't work, so I may just go ahead with this. I'm not even sure how much of an issue mouth breathing is for me: my ahi is pretty good as it is...I'm rambling but I guess I'm curious about hybrids and would like to hear people's impressions and why they use them.

How DO you know if mouth breathing is an issue?

OH, I recently started using a chin strap. I feel that it may help a bit, but my snore index went up when I started using this...so again, I thought that a mask that covers the mouth may be a good idea...

[Pugsy]

How DO you know if mouth breathing is an issue?

Mouth breathing will create a leak that will get flagged by the machine. Easy to spot on the software leak reports if it is going on very long at all.
Can't always go by how dry the mouth might be though because the mouth can dry out real easy depending on the person and it doesn't always mean that mouth breathing is a serious problem. Example...my mouth will dry out with as little as 5 minutes of mouth breathing and pretty darned dry. If the only mouth breathing I did was for 5 minutes I don't consider that to be much of an issue at all.

Now anything that causes us to wake up more often is unwanted and that includes not only big leaks but little leaks too. The the dry mouth is causing repeated awakenings even if the time spent mouth breathing is short we would want to try to fix it.

I know I mouth breathe a little. I wake up mouth breathing sometimes. Sometimes it shows up on the leak graph and sometimes it doesn't. If it doesn't show up on the leak report then it for sure is not a problem because you can mouth breathe and not have a big leak show up. I have confirmed it with an experiment I did.
When I see evidence of mouth breathing/leaking/opening on the software graphs sometimes it goes into large leak territory but for the most part it doesn't and since I sleep right through all of it I don't worry about short lived excursions into large leak territory

It all depends on how far you go into large leak territory and how long you stay there as to how much of an issue it really is unless it is causing a lot of wake ups.

[Sleep2Die4]

I'm curious about hybrids and would like to hear people's impressions

Quit working for me.

[hegel]

thanks guys. That Innomed looks pretty hefty...

I don't seem to have leak issues--I'm going in to my local sleep lab on the 6th, so I'll see what they say. I've been leaving my machine on when I get up in the night to pee--this may affect my leak readings? I'll stop starting tonight. Pugsy has the right attitude; I'm a bit of a fiddler, looking for the optimum set up. But I may be trying to solve a non existent problem.

[BleepingBeauty]

thanks guys. That Innomed looks pretty hefty...

I don't seem to have leak issues--I'm going in to my local sleep lab on the 6th, so I'll see what they say. I've been leaving my machine on when I get up in the night to pee--this may affect my leak readings? I'll stop starting tonight. Pugsy has the right attitude; I'm a bit of a fiddler, looking for the optimum set up. But I may be trying to solve a non existent problem.

I've also been using the Innomed Hybrid for several years now, and I would also recommend it over the Liberty for reasons already stated above. It IS more mask than nasal pillows alone, of course, but it works for me. FWIW, I see VS recorded on my data regularly, but it doesn't ever interfere with my therapy, so I don't worry about it.

Just a tip about getting up to use the bathroom: Don't remove the mask; just shut off the machine and disconnect the hose from the mask while you're away. In other words, keep the mask on your face so you don't have to readjust it when you get back into bed. Just hook the hose back up to it and start up the machine again. No LL on your data that way. HTH