Anyone had "Humidifier Fever" from their CPAP?

[lasseponken]

Hello All,

I am sure this did not come from my CPAP, but my HACE MJS-601. Humidifier fever is caused by mold and bacteria in the tank.

For several weeks I have been unable to sleep for more than an hour before the nostral seals. The air humidity has been 20% for a long time and is too dry for the Airsense 10 to handle, so I decided to start up my Hace portable humidifier, last time the tank smelled of mold when I filled it, and I got flu-like symptoms. So I decided to clean the tank first, this afternoon the headache and fever set on.

But, question, is there a risk I contaminated the CPAP?

Has this happened to anyone else?

[ChicagoGranny]

So I decided to clean the tank first, this afternoon the headache and fever set on.

Some clarity, please. Did you clean the HACE or the CPAP humidifier tank? Do you think the headache/fever was triggered by mold or cleaning solutions?

What is your practice with either device? Do you always use distilled water? Do you dump the water each morning? Or, do you top it off each night?

[lasseponken]

It was the tank for the HACE, I used washingup liquid and a brush. The brush is now unusable as it has some strange yellow substance on it. Rinsed tank several times after.

I clean the tank in the CPAP on some irregular basis, mostly when I get a weird taste in my mouth and there are small white flakes in the water, and the water is red-ish when I empty the CPAP tank in the sink.

I have not access to gallons of distilled water, not sold in sweden, only small bottles, like small soda cans. So not an option.

https://www.sylvane.com/blog/maintain-y ... nd-health/ The sympoms are described here.

[ChicagoGranny]

Tap water is acceptable. You might want to begin dumping it each morning and refilling it at bedtime. Both devices.

I don't do a lot of cleaning. Your tap water may dictate a regular cleaning.

[Julie]

Many people put a *little* vinegar in the cleaning up water for the tank, but try cleaning weekly, don't wait til you get a weird taste or see red.

[chunkyfrog]

It appears that that humidifier is ultrasonic.
Unfortunately, hard water will damage the ultrasonic device, voiding the warranty.
Distilled water would extend the life of the humidifier, as well as help eliminate new mold in the tank.
I have distilled my own water for years, knowing that our hardddd water ruins everything.

[prkl]

Someone I know (with COPD and SA) got to hospital just this week due to severe shortness of breath that had been going on for a few days. Luckily it was not COVID19, but some other infection. They had just started using a humidifier again in their CPAP, and I know their cleaning habit with the gear is less than optimal, so to speak. I suspect the uncleaned humidifier might have been the cause, but obviously there is no way of knowing for sure.

[babydinosnoreless]

Someone I know (with COPD and SA) got to hospital just this week due to severe shortness of breath that had been going on for a few days. Luckily it was not COVID19, but some other infection. They had just started using a humidifier again in their CPAP, and I know their cleaning habit with the gear is less than optimal, so to speak. I suspect the uncleaned humidifier might have been the cause, but obviously there is no way of knowing for sure.

If someone doesn't dump their water and refill thats on them. I've never heard of such a thing as letting you water get that yucky. No special cleaning needed. Dump in the morning refill at night. Nothing can grow.

[palerider]

Someone I know (with COPD and SA) got to hospital just this week due to severe shortness of breath that had been going on for a few days. Luckily it was not COVID19, but some other infection. They had just started using a humidifier again in their CPAP, and I know their cleaning habit with the gear is less than optimal, so to speak. I suspect the uncleaned humidifier might have been the cause, but obviously there is no way of knowing for sure.

I heard somebody has something happen to them, *I blame CPAP!*

[prkl]

Someone I know (with COPD and SA) got to hospital just this week due to severe shortness of breath that had been going on for a few days. Luckily it was not COVID19, but some other infection. They had just started using a humidifier again in their CPAP, and I know their cleaning habit with the gear is less than optimal, so to speak. I suspect the uncleaned humidifier might have been the cause, but obviously there is no way of knowing for sure.

I heard somebody has something happen to them, *I blame CPAP!*

Nope, that is not the case. As I mentioned in the post, there is no way of knowing for sure if the CPAP was related or not. There is a myriad of possible explanations (including COPD getting worse on its own, as it sometimes does), and the humidifier is just one of them. Wanted to reply to lasseponken, since I don't think that what he asked would be impossible, but obviously I should have stated the associated uncertainties in the above case more clearly. Sorry about that.

[Dog Slobber]

I suspect the uncleaned humidifier might have been the cause, but obviously there is no way of knowing for sure.

Yes, there are ways of knowing, with a considerable amount of certainty.

Statistics, patient history and studies.

CPAP has a long history of use, there are millions of devices in use and many studies done.

Had their been a correlation between respiratory illness between non-CPAP users, CPAP users and CPAP users with humidifiers, it would have shown up in the data.

It hasn't.

[palerider]

Someone I know (with COPD and SA) got to hospital just this week due to severe shortness of breath that had been going on for a few days. Luckily it was not COVID19, but some other infection. They had just started using a humidifier again in their CPAP, and I know their cleaning habit with the gear is less than optimal, so to speak. I suspect the uncleaned humidifier might have been the cause, but obviously there is no way of knowing for sure.

I heard somebody has something happen to them, *I blame CPAP!*

Nope, that is not the case. As I mentioned in the post, there is no way of knowing for sure if the CPAP was related or not. There is a myriad of possible explanations (including COPD getting worse on its own, as it sometimes does), and the humidifier is just one of them. Wanted to reply to lasseponken, since I don't think that what he asked would be impossible, but obviously I should have stated the associated uncertainties in the above case more clearly. Sorry about that.

"But I'm going to mention it in my ignorance just because idiots like me like to blame things on CPAP" just because you stuck a *disclaimer on it doesn't make it stupid.

Or, you coulda just said *NOTHING* and been smarter.

[prkl]

Based on quick browse through the related research, CPAP with or without humidifier seems to not significantly increase infections [1,2] and using humidifier indeed can improve especially dryness-related symptoms [3]. However, some research has found a significant increase in risk of upper airway infections associated with CPAP use [4], and the concern of insufficiently cleaned CPAP equipment causing pneumonia has been raised by doctors and health officials before [5].

I think we all can agree that using CPAP and humidifier is safe and beneficial, as long as the gear is cleaned properly.

This is all from me related to this topic, have a nice day everyone!

[1] Mercieca, Liam, et al. "Continuous Positive Airway Pressure: Is it a route for infection in those with Obstructive Sleep Apnoea?." Sleep Science 10.1 (2017): 28. URL: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5611769/
[2] Zamora, Trinidad Silvente, et al. "Infectious complications associated with the use of CPAP in patients with sleep apnea-hipopnea sindrome." (2012).
[3] Kreivi, Hanna-Riikka, et al. "Frequency of upper airway symptoms before and during continuous positive airway pressure treatment in patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome." Respiration 80.6 (2010): 488-494. URL: https://www.karger.com/Article/Abstract/321371
[4] Sanner, Bernd M., et al. "Effect of continuous positive airway pressure therapy on infectious complications in patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome." Respiration 68.5 (2001): 483-487. URL: https://www.karger.com/Article/Abstract/50555
[5] Schnirman, Ruby, et al. "A case of legionella pneumonia caused by home use of continuous positive airway pressure." SAGE open medical case reports 5 (2017): 2050313X17744981. URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/1 ... 3X17744981

[ChicagoGranny]

[5] Schnirman, Ruby, et al. "A case of legionella pneumonia caused by home use of continuous positive airway pressure." SAGE open medical case reports 5 (2017): 2050313X17744981.

This is a case of one individual. The investigators relied on superstition instead of science. They found no evidence that CPAP was the cause of infection. -----> From their investigation --->

They found used CPAP equipment which did not appear to be regularly cleaned and expect this was the cause of her legionella pneumonia. They did not test the equipment specifically for legionella.

ttps://www.karger.com/Article/Abstract/321371
[4] Sanner, Bernd M., et al. "Effect of continuous positive airway pressure therapy on infectious complications in patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome." Respiration 68.5 (2001): 483-487.

This is a 21-year old study. In the meantime and despite the ballooning of CPAP use, there have been no studies that confirmed an association between CPAP use and increased respiratory infections.

As personal anecdotes, both Gramps and I have experienced frequency of infections (colds) dropping to nearly non-existent from three or four per year prior to CPAP commencement. Both of us do much less cleaning than that recommended by CPAP manufacturers.