NO MASK

Found an article in today's N. Y. Times. It's called http://www.NOMASK.com
Looks uncomfortable. Check it out.........?
Any thoughts?
Anyone ever hear of it...........

I have heard it advertised on the radio, on Rush and Dr. Laura.

$169 bucks is one of the things that bothers me.

I am a side/stomach sleeper and just don't see it working that well for me.

I use the NasalAir II, as my main mask, and find it very comfortable. I do have another mask for those nights when it it doesn't.

gailzee wrote:Found an article in today's N. Y. Times. It's called http://www.NOMASK.com
Looks uncomfortable.

Same thing as CPAPPRO.COM. Same site, even.

The ins and outs:

1) People who absolutely can't work with anything else, who toss and turn, hate the constant wake-ups from straps pulling things slightly askew, and don't mind the dental appliance aspect, apparently think this thing is a godsend.

2) Everyone else thinks it's a cheap piece of crap, not worth 1/10th of the price (one of the docs at my sleep clinic is also a hosehead, and he's tried most masks there are, and he's in this second class).

For me, I'm not particularly deterred by the cost of it (because it's made by a small company, their costs are going to be higher than a national company, they don't have the volume), nor the "no returns" policy, per se (same reason, they don't have the volume to absorb the cost of the occasional returned unit).

But...

I am rather deterred by the fact that you can ONLY buy them on-line. So there's no way to try one, or even SEE one, before you've bought it. Just the idea that it could show up and be made of the flimsiest plastic ever (as some have reported) and I still couldn't return it bothers me.

What I'm saying is that, unlike others, I don't think the high price or lack of return policy NECESSARILY means that the company is cheating people or just out for a quick buck.... but it doesn't particularly lend me the confidence I would personally need to try the thing.

Liam, up again after throwing my mask against the wall in disgust.

The CPAP Pro was invented by a patient and was shown at the annual sleep medicine scientific meetings exhibit hall in 1997, I think. The inventor was wearing it at his booth during the exhibit hall hours.

He was also peddling a book he wrote that was titled "Snoring Can Kill".

It didn't seem to pick up any steam in the next few years. No manufacturer of CPAP and masks thought enough of it to buy him out, and I think he eventually sold the company to someone else. In the past year or so there has been an active radio campaign. I've probably gotten several dozen emails about this product.

To the best of my knowledge, it has always been an internet only product (or a phone order to the company) because DME companies never stocked it. I think the original price was even higher than it is today.

It gets people's attention because of the NO MASK ad they are using. Granted there is no nasal "mask" in the traditional senxe, but it is still a CPAP interface and it's still hard to keep those nasal prongs in the nose. I've never heard the radio ad, but from some of the questions I've gotten, I think people hear this and think that they can somehow totally eliminate a CPAP interface. How they think they can get the air from the tubing into their airway I just don't know.

I've not tried it myself -- as I mentioned in another post, I have an aversion to holding anything in my mouth (other than food) and I don't think I could use it at all.

It may be like the F&P Oracle interface -- it's for a limited market, not everyone wants to try it.