Mouth Breather?

rested gal · Post by **rested gal** » Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:15 am

Software can show if a person is getting a high leak rate and show if any massive air leaks are happening. Software cannot tell you where the leaks originate. You have to do your own detective work about that.

A very dry mouth when NOT using a full face mask (covers nose and mouth) is often an indication that a person has been mouth breathing or that treatment air has been gushing out the mouth while exhaling.

A dry mouth is quite common for many people USING a full face mask when they mouth breathe their treatment air. If the FF mask itself is not leaking, then dry mouth would not indicate a leak.. dry mouth just goes with mouth breathing, even with a FF mask, for many people.

Occasional mouth leaks like you described are not necessarily going to interfere with good treatment during the night as a whole. The operative word being "occasional." But generally if a person is aware of air puffing out of the mouth while awake or drifting off to sleep, or wake up during the night aware of air escaping through the mouth, they might be well on their way to some massive mouth air leaks when the total relaxation of sleep occurs. Good idea to keep an eye on the leak graph via software to be sure massive air leaks that many people can simply sleep through don't interfere with treatment.

But if the mouth is not dry in the morning, usually that's a pretty good sign that mouth air leaks or mouth breathing are not a big problem.

cwsanfor · Post by **cwsanfor** » Wed Oct 25, 2006 6:10 am

I then Switched back to my hybrid which has a removed chin cup. The lower part of the mouth cushion now pushes my lower teeth inwards and loosens the teeth.

Anyone have this experience/possible solution?

I have that problem with the CF2 and UMFF, but not so much the Hybrid. My solution is to use the HC431 or HC432 most of the time.

Complete disclosure: The Hybrid gives me a much higher AHI, and this HC432 seems to have brought its own plague of locusts in the form of a strange series of hard bumps on my face following the line where the mask fits. Not simple pimples, and not an abrasion like you can get on the bridge of your nose with the CF2 or UMFF. The fact is that all these masks blow (nyack nyack nyack).