Link between inner/middle ear and CPAP ?

Today my tinnitus has gone crazy, all of a sudden my left ear is buzzing like mad, which it does when I have a cold. So either I am about to get a cold, or something is blocking my ear making the tinnitus louder. The noise I get is a loud hum. I have suffered from it for years, but it is only noticeable with colds these days. What concerns me is that each night my System One 60 series humidifer tank is half empty after 6 hours, so 2 nights sleep and it is pretty much empty. Is there any possible way, the pressure of the cpap is pushing the vapours/mist in to my inner or middle ear ? This is my 4th night on CPAP.

Also can CPAP cause cold like symptoms ? I have been sneezing a lot today and my nose has just started to run. I am hoping it is just a cold coming on but just checking.

If there wasn't a link, the sound would fall out. You have vent tubes (drains) in the ears and eye ducts that open into the airway. Jim

Water consumption is driven primarily by the humidity setting chosen and the ambient room humidity but pressures used and excessive leaks also can play a factor along with number of hours used.
The fact that you use about 1/2 a tank a night isn't unusual. I rarely every have enough water left for another night and sometimes I have used so much that the tank barely has any water in it.

Your cold/allergy like symptoms could be in response to the humidity setting but you may be in between a rock and a hard place with the nasal dryness and nosebleeds. If using the setting of 3...maybe try the setting of 2. For some people too much humidity causes allergy/cold like symptoms...so if you determine that you are NOT coming down with a cold you might consider the humidity setting again.

I have no idea if your worsening tinnitus is caused by the cpap pressure. I wouldn't be impossible though due to the Eustachian tube connection. If it is related to cpap I would think more from pressure than humidity though but I will be honest I don't know that much about what might cause or make tinnitus worse.

Pugsy wrote:Water consumption is driven primarily by the humidity setting chosen and the ambient room humidity but pressures used and excessive leaks also can play a factor along with number of hours used.
The fact that you use about 1/2 a tank a night isn't unusual. I rarely every have enough water left for another night and sometimes I have used so much that the tank barely has any water in it.

Your cold/allergy like symptoms could be in response to the humidity setting but you may be in between a rock and a hard place with the nasal dryness and nosebleeds. If using the setting of 3...maybe try the setting of 2. For some people too much humidity causes allergy/cold like symptoms...so if you determine that you are NOT coming down with a cold you might consider the humidity setting again.

I have no idea if your worsening tinnitus is caused by the cpap pressure. I wouldn't be impossible though due to the Eustachian tube connection. If it is related to cpap I would think more from pressure than humidity though but I will be honest I don't know that much about what might cause or make tinnitus worse.

Thanks Pugsy. I had an awful night last night, my nose is so bunged up that I keep snorting when I try and breathe with the cpap and I woke up with a totally blocked nose multiple times. When I sat up it got a bit better but my nose is running all the time and I feel so lethargic. Do you know if cpap can actually cause exact cold like symptoms, even down to the fatigue and malaise ? When I look on the web there are loads of articles on cold-like symptoms from cpap but not much details. I just really wish I could tell if it was a proper cold or just cold-like symptoms from the cpap. I know no one can answer that for sure. I certainly feel like I have a cold, but I didn't have a sore throat or anything, I just feel very tired, spacey, and bunged up. I turned down my humidity to 2 but it didn't help, I will try 1 tonight. I had it on 3 the night before. I was just concerned maybe the mist went up in to the Eustachian tube of the ears, as I get this exact same type of loud tinnitus when my ear is blocked during colds.

Sometimes a Cold is just a Cold. I see XPAP, being blamed for every thing that happens to humans, when the real blame is we are human, we are all a defective organism, growing old and breaking down. Treat the Cold, not the XPAP. JIM

BTW: The wife and I both caught you cold, she is at a disadvantage because she doesn't use XPAP, so she doesn't have a machine to blame, I don't let her touch mine....

We are currently on Vit "C", 3,000 units daily, and I add Zinc tablet too. Waiting for body to kick it out. In reality, I think we got it from the family, they give until we hurt. Jim

Usually when cpap humidity is the cause of nasal issues and those cold like symptoms it's strictly nasal symptoms that are present.
More like an allergy attack with sneezing and congestion and drainage and pressure maybe.
General fatigue malaise crappy feeling...not normally but those feelings could be secondary to just having a crappy night in general.
Google "cpap rhinitis" for more reading material.
Google "Eustachian tube dysfunction" for the only way that anything in the nasal passageway and get to the inner ear. Consult your doctor if the ear situation doesn't improve...it may or may not be related the cpap therapy but we don't mess with eyes or ears that have problems that don't go away or ease up in a reasonable time with reasonable methods.

You may just have caught a cold. Whatever the symptoms are though...just treat the symptoms as best you can like you would whether it was a common cold or an allergy attack.

Blizzard: I have tinnitus in my right ear and eustachian tube issues. I've often wondered about cpap pressure/humidity and my eustachian tubes. In my experience, cpap has made no difference in the latter. But eustachian tubes are temperamental in some people. This winter I'm going to pay more attention to this issue. But again, so far whenever I've suspected my cpap machine to be causing eustachian tube problems, it's always been something else. I'm curious if you come down with a cold or not; keep us posted.

p.s. using a squeeze bottle 'nettie' style nose rinse also has some effect on my ears. the pressure always opens my eustachian tubes and temporarily improves my hearing; but I also can get a funny 'gurgling' for some hours afterwards that makes me suspicious as to whether the whole thing is worth doing.