HELP NEEDED!!!

[ajp]

Just found out my husband left his machine at work yesterday (4 hours away)
He has an older machine here, but no mask, and can't find any place local that carries them. My idea is to make one, just to get by for 2 more nights.
I'm thinking of maybe modifying a painters mask, or respirator

Any ideas would be helpful

if all else fails, there's always duct tape...lol)

[Julie]

Do you have hoses?

Sleeping somewhat upright (vs flat) in a recliner often helps in an emergency... do you have one?

I'd be very, very careful about making a mask... what about the CO2 vent?

But don't use duct tape .

[kteague]

If you put your city in the title line, there just may be someone in your area who has a spare.

[jimbud]

But don't use duct tape .

Very good!
JPB

[HoseCrusher]

A painters dust mask won't work.

A respirator has better possibilities. The problem is figuring out how much to vent to keep from rebreathing your exhaled air. This is a trial and error effort. ResMed views 24 liters/minute as a large leak. That may be a reasonable target or reduce it to something like 20 liters/minute.

In order to measure this you need to hook your hose to your respirator, then plug the main supply. What is left is the vent flow. Take something like a 13 gallon trash bag and secure it around your mask. 13 gallons is close to 49 liters so if your vent size is correct it should take about 2 minutes and 47 seconds to fill the garbage bag.

Rescue Tape will work great in this situation. Just give it enough time to set.

Rather than doing all of this it may be better to visit your local hospital or walk in clinic to see if they have an extra mask laying around. It may not be a perfect fit, but rescue tape can help there as well...

The lesson to be learned from this is to make sure you have extra supplies at home so this is never an issue again.