Can dry mouth cause mouth leaks

[Al N]

I apologize for the topic as I'm sure it's been discussed over and over. I did a search and didn't find quite what I was looking for. Maybe just didn't have the patience to go back far enough.

Anyways my question is can dry mouth cause mouth breathing or is it always the other way around. My reason for asking is that last night I used my new tap pap. My only problem I had with it was dry mouth. I have had problems since switching to the fx, I've been using with major leaks, most of them I believe were mouth leaks that I decided not to fight with, In the interest of getting less interrupted sleep. I have a chin strap I mostly gave up on as it didn't help a whole lot with the problem. Last night after waking up a couple hours into the start to a pretty good nights sleep I awoke with extremely dry mouth. I put on the chin strap drank some water and went back to sleep. Same issues the rest of the night my mouth wasn't dropping open but was so dry I almost believe that it was causing me to try to breathe through my mouth still at times. About 48 minutes out of nine in major leaks spread out over three or four times. I believe no leaks at all with the mask.

[Pugsy]

I am pretty sure the mouth breathing is dry mouth culprit the majority of the time but you know that there are other causes for dry mouth...meds...general hydration. So mouth breathing isn't the only cause.
I don't think that dry mouth itself causes more mouth breathing though. We breathe through our mouths either from habit or a physical need for more air than is able to be delivered through the nose.

[Al N]

[quote="Pugsy"]I am pretty sure the mouth breathing is dry mouth culprit the majority of the time but you know that there are other causes for dry mouth


I know for sure that my blood sugars have been wacky again which can and usually does cause sever cotton mouth. That's what lead me to question what was going on. I put my chin strap on and had it pretty snug. So my mouth wasn't dropping open for sure. Just grasping at straws I guess. I went back and tried my old ff mask over the last few days and they just won't work. So whatever leaks are there I'll have to deal with. That is first time the dry mouth itself ever woke me up so don't see it being an issue. Was hoping maybe that might have been the cause of the mouth breathing itself.

[Pugsy]

I went back and tried my old ff mask over the last few days and they just won't work. So whatever leaks are there I'll have to deal with.

How much are the leaks? Are we talking grand canyon leaks or minor rut in the road leaks?
I know for a fact that I do some mouth breathing but grand canyon mouth breathing leaks are very rare so I choose to not take drastic measures. For me trying to use a FFM would cause more problems (long story) than just shrugging my shoulders and moving on if I see a few less than perfect leak spikes.

[Al N]

I went back and tried my old ff mask over the last few days and they just won't work. So whatever leaks are there I'll have to deal with.

How much are the leaks? Are we talking grand canyon leaks or minor rut in the road leaks?

Between 40 and fifty sometimes a half hour at a time usually around an hour a night at most. Last night was around 48 minutes total. I know the leaks are too much, but it is still better sleep than dealing with a ff mask. Chin strap don't seem to resolve the issue. Taping prob would then i get back into not sleeping as well. Plus I don't think taping is even an option with tap pap.

[Pugsy]

Leaks over 30 L/min with the S9 machine are pretty much going to impact the machine's ability to tell what kind of event you are maybe having...so likely we would see "unknown" apneas.
Over 40 L/min and the machine may not be able to even sense the apnea event. That's where the grand canyon comes in for my own personal thoughts.

That said..15 minutes here and there throughout the night isn't the end of the world. Sometimes that is preferable to no sleep due to other factors. That is where I am at with the leaks (whatever the cause). It may not be ideal but severely fragmented sleep due to other factors is far from ideal also. I will take 7 hours of good sleep and 1 hour of bad leaks over 8 hours of really crappy sleep any day of the week. It's obviously not ideal but it is what it is.
I have some problems with my neck that prevents my being able to wear a full face mask (lower strap issues) comfortably enough to get good sleep even if I didn't have any FFM sealing and leak issues.

Regarding the Tap Pap and a bit of mouth taping....actually I do think it would be possible to add some reinforcement. Might not be a perfect seal but I think it would help some. ChunkyFrog has a way of making her own chin up strips and it could easily be modified so that the lips are secured a little around the part of the mouth guard that comes out the lips.

[Al N]

I had 2 hyp last night no unspecified 14 central very rare and only 2 obstructive. So I'm not seeing a bunch of unspecified ever. Not sure what to make of the centrals. Kind of wrote it off unless it keeps repeating itself. I know it's not optimal treatment but I sleep better.

[StuUnderPressure]

Between 40 and fifty sometimes a half hour at a time usually around an hour a night at most. Last night was around 48 minutes total.

Are your numbers referring to number of "minutes" of leak OR "volume" of leak for X minutes?

[Pugsy]

I had 2 hyp last night no unspecified 14 central very rare and only 2 obstructive. So I'm not seeing a bunch of unspecified ever. Not sure what to make of the centrals. Kind of wrote it off unless it keeps repeating itself. I know it's not optimal treatment but I sleep better.

I have seen a handful of unknowns during times of big leak around 40 L/min...so I know it can still sense the events and at around 40 L/min my therapy is definitely impacted because there can be a truckload of events...most likely in REM sleep because that is where my OSA is much worse. If I have a big leak in non REM sleep not much happens because not much would happen anyway. My OSA is particularly worse during REM (53 per hour in REM vs 12 per hour in non REM per the sleep study).

It's very possible that not much of any great excitement happened during the time in large leak anyway.

Centrals...14 over the entire night...not a big deal. Probably related to tossing and turning centrals and a few sleep onset centrals. Especially not a big deal if they are clustered around time frames where you were likely awake.

And yes, we both know it might not be optimal therapy during short periods of time during the night but short periods of large leak don't mean the entire night's therapy is totally in the toilet. Sometimes we have to make compromises and I totally understand yours. I have done the very same thing myself.

[avi123]

IIMO, the answer is yes. If your mouth is dry you tend to open it and then if air goes thru it, it would effect the leak rate (unless you're using a full face mask).

Dry mouth is also age related:

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/dry-mo ... ION=causes

[Al N]

Between 40 and fifty sometimes a half hour at a time usually around an hour a night at most. Last night was around 48 minutes total.

Are your numbers referring to number of "minutes" of leak OR "volume" of leak for X minutes?

40 and fifty size of leak

[NateS]

I apologize for the topic as I'm sure it's been discussed over and over. I did a search and didn't find quite what I was looking for. Maybe just didn't have the patience to go back far enough.

Anyways my question is can dry mouth cause mouth breathing or is it always the other way around.

In my own case, I do think it is a mad circle. Mouth-breathing may dry out my mouth, but then my dry mouth seems to cause me to open my mouth more.

Whenever you see a movie of someone in a boat or on an island where they supposedly have a parched mouth and are seemingly dying of thirst, their mouths are usually hanging open. I think it is a natural reflex for your mouth to sort of hang slightly open when your mouth is dry.

Regards, Nate

[Todzo]

I apologize for the topic as I'm sure it's been discussed over and over. I did a search and didn't find quite what I was looking for. Maybe just didn't have the patience to go back far enough.

Anyways my question is can dry mouth cause mouth breathing or is it always the other way around. My reason for asking is that last night I used my new tap pap. My only problem I had with it was dry mouth. I have had problems since switching to the fx, I've been using with major leaks, most of them I believe were mouth leaks that I decided not to fight with, In the interest of getting less interrupted sleep. I have a chin strap I mostly gave up on as it didn't help a whole lot with the problem. Last night after waking up a couple hours into the start to a pretty good nights sleep I awoke with extremely dry mouth. I put on the chin strap drank some water and went back to sleep. Same issues the rest of the night my mouth wasn't dropping open but was so dry I almost believe that it was causing me to try to breathe through my mouth still at times. About 48 minutes out of nine in major leaks spread out over three or four times. I believe no leaks at all with the mask.

Hi Ai N!

My personal trainer has noted in particular that I am not a mouth breather.

When I do wake up with dry mouth once in a while it clears every time as I reduce my breathing volume, every time. I do not close my mouth, it is already shut. I do not drink water or open my mouth. I simply breath less.

I am reading an article[1] that deals with central hypopneas and note that some events end with opening the mouth. So to answer your question "can dry mouth cause mouth breathing or is it always the other way around" - well - I think that it is quite possible that the reduced circulation and metabolism caused by the excessive breathing which would bring about such events as central hypopneas may well also affect the salivary glands and cause the dry mouth. Simply yes, I think it is quiet possible that what caused your dry mouth also brought you to the place where you opened your mouth.

As well, your comments about blood sugars are probably part of this as well. Respiratory events obstructive or central will raise the stress hormone levels and with them the blood sugar levels tend to go up. Unused sugar in the blood causes the kidneys to dump the excess sugars into the bladder and you can end up a bit dehydrated and so tend toward dry mouth to begin with.

The extra leaks probably relate to excessive movement from the extra awakenings.

If any of this is true then reducing stress in your life is probably the best path to better results.

May we find great sleep!!

Todzo

[1]: Randerath WJ; Treml M; Priegnitz C; Stieglitz S; Hagmeyer L; Morgenstern C. Evaluation of noninvasive algorithm for differentiation of obstructive and central hypopneas. SLEEP 2013;36(3):363-368.
Related article ( commentary ): 305

[newsnore]

Quote - "In my own case, I do think it is a mad circle. Mouth-breathing may dry out my mouth, but then my dry mouth seems to cause me to open my mouth more.

Whenever you see a movie of someone in a boat or on an island where they supposedly have a parched mouth and are seemingly dying of thirst, their mouths are usually hanging open. I think it is a natural reflex for your mouth to sort of hang slightly open when your mouth is dry."

I am inclined to agree with this post.

It is amazing - this very subject/question has been on my mind lately because I was having problems with waking up with a horribly dry mouth. It crossed my mind "I wonder if more humidity would help?" I had it set quite low because we have had quite hot summer nights here in the North of NZ and I didn't like the thought of breathing hot air. So I upped the humidity level (approx 10 degrees F in temp) and lo and behold the dry mouth troubles disappeared completely, and it has stayed that way for a few weeks now. My theory (basic as it is) is, that, (similar to the previous poster) when I started mouth breathing, because the air exhaling through my mouth was relatively dry, it dried my mouth and it became all sticky, so, unconsciously (while asleep) I needed to breathe more through my mouth and the dry sticky mouth just worsened - the more I breathed through it the more I had to breathe through it. When I upped the humidity (in 2 stages) it moistened my mouth making it more comfortable and maybe the message was sent back to headquarters "you can close it again" This of course won't work for everyone, but it certainly did for me - as even using a chinstrap didn't completely stop the problem but the higher humidity did. When we are awake doing exercise and breathing through our mouth we keep moving our tongue around and even licking our lips to stop this happening, but when we are asleep we obviously aren't programmed to do that.

[Al N]

Quote - "In my own case, I do think it is a mad circle. Mouth-breathing may dry out my mouth, but then my dry mouth seems to cause me to open my mouth more.

Whenever you see a movie of someone in a boat or on an island where they supposedly have a parched mouth and are seemingly dying of thirst, their mouths are usually hanging open. I think it is a natural reflex for your mouth to sort of hang slightly open when your mouth is dry."

I am inclined to agree with this post.

It is amazing - this very subject/question has been on my mind lately because I was having problems with waking up with a horribly dry mouth. It crossed my mind "I wonder if more humidity would help?" I had it set quite low because we have had quite hot summer nights here in the North of NZ and I didn't like the thought of breathing hot air. So I upped the humidity level (approx 10 degrees F in temp) and lo and behold the dry mouth troubles disappeared completely, and it has stayed that way for a few weeks now. My theory (basic as it is) is, that, (similar to the previous poster) when I started mouth breathing, because the air exhaling through my mouth was relatively dry, it dried my mouth and it became all sticky, so, unconsciously (while asleep) I needed to breathe more through my mouth and the dry sticky mouth just worsened - the more I breathed through it the more I had to breathe through it. When I upped the humidity (in 2 stages) it moistened my mouth making it more comfortable and maybe the message was sent back to headquarters "you can close it again" This of course won't work for everyone, but it certainly did for me - as even using a chinstrap didn't completely stop the problem but the higher humidity did. When we are awake doing exercise and breathing through our mouth we keep moving our tongue around and even licking our lips to stop this happening, but when we are asleep we obviously aren't programmed to do that.

I had just recently taken my heated hose off and put the regular hose back. Plus I turned the humidifier down as the air seemed a bit warm. So I was planning turning the humidifier up tonight and maybe even putting the heated hose back on. Thanks for the input maybe ill have better results too