Heated tubing necessary?

No, the hose cover doesn't have to be snug fit at all. But it does have to be able to stay on some how.
Padacheek.com has a nice hose cozy with a zipper. Really easy on and off with the zipper and super nice construction.
A bit pricey but very well made.

Back before heated hoses and the nice padacheek hose cozy I made my own hose cozy with some soft fleece wrapped around the hose and secured with scotch tape. Wasn't real pretty but got the job done. Scotch tape easy to pull off for hose cleaning and then just use some more to hold it together when putting the fleece back on. Though to be honest...frequent hose washing has never been something that I do....the hose just doesn't get that dirty.

Thanks, Pugsy. The postage would be the problem there. I now see that the tube I got was from intus at http://www.eu-pap.co.uk/6ft-fleece-tube ... er-reviews - the other reviews also find it hard to put on, and they say Resmed does a better on. I will see if I can get that if I can't get the heated tube.

It is a tube so measure around the hose and add 2 inches. Measure the length of the hose and add a few inches. Now cut a rectangle to those measurements. sew the long ends together by hand or machine and you have a hose cover.

As for setting up a new machine you will get the clinical manual with it (if not it is online). It is very simple to do. If you can use a cell phone you can do this. It is easier then setting the old VCRs.

Yeah....I know the postage cost sucks.

To be honest...if you can get a newer machine that includes the heated hose...that would be where I would put my money.
There's more advantages to the newer machines than just the heated hose.
Better data collection (more comprehensive)...newer improved algorithm and from what I hear much quieter machine.

I thought of you first thing this morning... woke up with a little bit of condensation in my nasal pillow mask.
Opened the windows last night and the temp dropped but I didn't compensate for the drop with a little more warmth using my heated hose. I was still using summer temps and I now need to warm the air up a bit so that the condensation is better prevented. I typically use cooler temps in the summer and warmer in the winter and leave the humidity the same year round.
My bedroom usually gets really cold during the winter...I prefer cooler temps in general so always turn the thermostat down to 50 degrees F...and my house is an old farmhouse that doesn't have much insulation and the bedroom has 2 windows..one faces north and the other east...so it gets even colder than where the thermostat is. It gets downright cold in my bedroom. It's hard to heat even during the day when I have thermostat up.

Heated hose is sooooooooo much nicer. The hose cozies help but they add weight to pull on my mask plus sometimes they don't prevent the condensation at the mask level.

I could have sworn I posted a reply - must have deleted it. Thanks for details on making a cover. But yes, I will try to get a machine with a heated hose. There seems no reason why one could not be prescribed. I am pretty sure that whoever services the machine will know about this.
Even if it gets really cold and I heat the bedroom in the evening, it would be very unusual to heat at night, so the rainout problem will remain.
Thanks again for hte useful information.

Good luck to you. I know that they do things differently where you are at. If you can get your doctor on board it can make things go smoother.

Rain out won't hurt you but it is sure damned annoying...just ask my husband because the only time my cpap therapy has ever bothered him or woke him up was with the rain out....it's amazing how much noise just a few drops of water in the hose or mask will make.

I would hope most docs would write for the heated hose these days. Really no reason not to. No one enjoys rainout.

Like many others here on CPAPtalk my fleece hose cozy/cover works fine for 80% of the year... for the other 20% during the winter I may use my Hibernite hose. Of course I live in coastal Central California which is appreciably warmer year round - obviously your locale will have a lot of impact (Minnesota anybody? ) However ,all that being said, add the heated hose option if you're getting a new machine, it can't hurt and isn't that much more expensive.

I like this hose cover by member Sleepguy. Be sure to read the instructions first before you try to put it on the hose:

http://www.amazon.com/HOSE-CASE/dp/B007 ... =pur+sleep

Needless to say I got a bit of rainout this morning - first coldish night of the year.

Isn't that the way things go? Talk about it and it happens.
Was it in the hose...the mask...or both?
Was it the noise or wetness that bothered you? Wake you up?

It was too small to be noisy - but cold and wet round my nose. It woke me up, or woke me up a bit more.

Probably the addition of the moisture in your own exhaled breath mixing in with the incoming humidified air at the mask level and it cooled down to the point the rain out occurred.
It won't make the usual noise at the mask level that it makes in the hose itself.
If no moisture in the hose then probably the moisture from your own breaths just tipped the scale when the cooler bedroom got factored in.

There's more moisture in our breaths than people realize.
Did you know that people living in the high desert and not even using a humidifier at all will get rain out in the mask if the conditions are cool enough.
Their own breathing is source of the moisture.

You have some choices to help eliminate the annoyance. Some of the choices don't appeal to you and I respect that fact.
The bottom line is that the air in the mask (and hose if you get water in the hose as well as mask) has to be able to stay warmer so that it doesn't cool down and release the moisture.
How you accomplish that end....you have choices. Getting a new better machine isn't going to happen overnight....I would suggest that you look at those choices again and decide which is more annoying ..the choice or the moisture in the mask or hose.

If it were me....I would use the existing hose cozy...yes, it's a pain in the butt to put on but you don't absolutely have to wash that hose once a week or even once a month to have to go through removing and putting it back on so often. See if it even helps or not before worrying about removing it.

I know you are wanting a new machine and a real integrated heated hose...I don't blame you but that isn't going to happen tonight or tomorrow night or even the next night.
Unless you want to step up and purchase your own machine that is exactly what you want you are going to have to jump through the other hoops and that will take time and that won't help you right now.

Thanks, Pugsy. Not sure I've made myself clear here. I don't have a hose cover any longer. I can buy my own machine. It could happen fast but it makes more sense to wait and see if I can get it prescribed.
If not, I can surely get a Resmed hose cover prescribed. That'll be the date when I decide whether to keep the current machine for another 5 years.

Thanks to everyone for their help, my questions have been answered.

Sorry, didn't realize the hose cozy was already history. I thought you still had it. My bad.
Yes, you pretty much have your options lined up and only you can make the final decision on how you want to proceed.
I can't think of anything that hasn't been covered.

I haven't used a non-heated tube for a loooong time.
No interest trying.