Mouth breather? How should I know? I'M SLEEPING!!

Hi, all. I'm very new to all of this, suspect it's already been discussed, but haven't found anything that answers my question.

I live by myself, don't have sleep-overs, don't own a video camera or know anyone that has one I could borrow and don't have any pets with the capability of learning sign language. Is there some way I'm not thinking about to figure out if/when/how much I'm breathing through my mouth?

I should say that I don't have my equipment yet, and I got wondering about the mouth breathing thing when I was reading about the bazillion mask choices there are. When I had my titration study, my sleep tech thought I did best with nasal pillows, although it was a very rough night and she had to do a fair amount of educated guessing. But when I had braces a couple of decades ago, my retainer was a flexible one-piece rubber deal (like a fb mouthpiece; yeah, I'm thinking about seeing if I can use it to make a CPAPPro-like device), and when I wore it, I had some drooling issues. Does that prove I'm a mouth breather, at least some of the time? If not, any suggestions on how I figure it out? Thanks!

Hi Marshaeb. Welcome to the forum. As you've undoubtly already discovered, this site is an endless resource for information and help.

One possible way to detect if you're mouth breating is if you wake with a dry mouth. Hopefully your equipment will provide additional info for you.

I also live alone. I knew I was a mouth breather because I would often wake up with my mouth open, and I would also wake up with a dry mouth and often a sore throat. I use a full face mask.

If you didn't get a full face mask and then you find that you do breathe through your mouth, some people on the forum use a chin strap to keep their mouths closed. I have never used one, so I can't advise you on that, but perhaps others will chime in.

That's why you need a data recording machine. It will show large leaks and you will know you are mouth breathing.

HA HA!!! ME TOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wait until you get your equipment. I highly recommend a chinstrap. I'm currently favoring this one:

https://www.cpap.com/productpage/deluxe ... hleak.html

See pix of how I mounted my mask to it, to eliminate the mess of headgear AND chinstrap, and it just works much better for me to stabilize my mask:

s124.photobucket.com/albums/p36/BabetteLaMauvaise/CPAP/

Again, start with dry mouth and throat, waking up to snorting and choking because you're trying to breathe out of mouth and mask is making that difficult, and other anomalies.

Good luck and keep us posted!
Babette

Thanks for the welcome, everybody!!

Yes, BigEd, this is an amazing site -- tons of information and so much good-hearted personal support. In my thought, the ideal support group (ideal DOESN'T equal perfect; perfect not required). As I was PM’ing someone earlier today, if it weren’t for this site and everything I’ve already learned, I’d be the latest victim of Bait ‘n’ Switch ‘r’ Us (the first DME I consulted; yes, I left them in my dust), using the most basic machine made and constantly worried because I’d be getting no info. What a Godsend.

All of you asked this in one way or another: Do I wake up with an open mouth/dry mouth/sore throat? Only if I fall asleep in my recliner, which makes sense, since my head falls back; but not when I wake up after going to bed. So maybe it's a non-problem.

I’m hoping to have my insurance predetermination approved soon -- maybe tomorrow? Assuming it is, I’ll be getting the M Series Pro and will be able to pay attention to the numbers. I’ll look for large leaks, and I’ll also keep a chinstrap in mind. I’m planning on getting the Swift LT or Opus 360, but when I had the titration study, the tech gave me a nasal mask and a full face mask, so I’ll also have those options, if necessary.

And, hey, there may be another advantage here. When I was growing up, I worked at the horse farm next door. They had all breeds, but they showed Hackney ponies and used “neck sweats” -- material wrapped around their necks -- to keep a long, lean line on their necks. Maybe I’ll get that wide chinstrap anyway, Babette, put a layer of plastic around it, then some kind of comfy material on the outside, and see if it keeps the ol’ neck nice and tight.

Gotta go. Thanks again, everybody.

Marsha

You need either a good sleep doctor or a good DME who will actually go over those numbers with you and help you determine whether the leak number(s) indicate mouth breathing. My doctor is useless but my DME is really great and worked with me for weeks downloading numbers as I tried different masks. In my case the results were unfortunately pretty clear...only full face masks brought the leak numbers down, ergo I need a full face mask. Yes, I hate it and would rather go back to my Swift nasal pillows, but that's the way it goes. It's more important to me to have my treatment be effective, which as I understand it it would NOT be if I had higher leak numbers.

Dry mouth may be a clue, but it's not always a reliable indicator. IIRC, I had very little dryness on the very days that my numbers showed that I must have been mouth breathing. I actually have more dryness now with the full face mask, even though I suspect I breath less through my mouth now because the small mask "pushes my mouth closed" quite comfortably, at least when I'm awake.

With a good fitting FF mask, you by-pass the mouthbreathing problems completely. If you get a machine that uses full data like Encore Pro, you can see what goes on while you are sleeping to some extent. If you use a nasal mask and tape your mouth completely closed off, you are sure you aren't mouthbreathing. These are the most reliable ways to insure your treatment success. Jim

My sleep tech noticed that I was a mouth breather during my titration study and doc included chinstrap in order to DME - so I didn't have to guess. But I figured it out fast enough (both mouth breathing and chinstrap not working) because of dry mouth in the morning. I tend to have pretty variable leak rates at times because of thrashing around in my sleep so for me leak rates are not always a reliable indicator. Everyone's different

Mindy

Just because you are a mouth breather while untreated, doesn't mean you will be one when treated. I breathed through my mouth at least some prior to treatment but I am using a Swift LT with no issues. YMMV

Mouth breather?


you have a Remstar Pro, if it is the M series it will give leak data from the LCD display. Look at your 7-day average and 30 day average, are the very similar?

How do you determine what is high? Answer: Compare what you get from the LCD display to what the mask manufacturer supplies on the flow chart that comes with your mask. You find that flow chart, look up your pressure and it will tell you how many liters per minute of intentional leak you have from the mask. This leak assumes you have no external leak on the mask like between your face and the cushion. Any leak there will cause the machine to report a higher leak. So if you find the mask leak rate and subtract it from what is displayed on the machine the difference is "external" leak or leak from the cushion and your face or out your mouth. When the leak comes from the mouth the AHI will be higher.

For example:

Machine shows you have 34L/m avg leak
Flow chart for that pressure says mask will leak at 28 L/m.

34L/m
-28L/m
________
6 L/m actual external leak.

Large leak like from the mouth will cause the Leak rate reported by the machine to be very high, it all depends on the mask and your pressure but if leak exceeds the 75L/m rate the machine alarm will sound if enabled.

If you suspect mouth breathing, enable the Mask:Alert feature and it will beep if you start mouth breathing.

Other signs you may be mouth breathing:

-All the water is gone from the humidifier or it is using much more water
-you wake up with extreme dry mouth and or sore throat.

Another way to determine if you are mouth breathing:

Keep track of the machine leak rate for a few days,
then tape your mouth for one night if the leak rate drops you know that therapy has been escaping from
the mouth. If you use tape be sure to fold about 1/4" of it back over itself for a "removal flap", so if you
have to remove it suddenly you have a place to grab it where it doesn't stick.

Whoosh, Goofproof, Mindy, BeanMeScot & Snoredog, I saw this on Saturday and didn't think I needed to say anything, but it keeps going. Folks, I posted my question more than three months ago. I don't know why it was resurrected, but it wasn't resurrected by me. If you're writing this info for me (and I'm not entirely sure if you are or if it's for somebody else in this thread), I appreciate it a lot, but I'm good to go. Consistently great leak rate, and my AHI usually hangs around 0.0 to 0.3. (Although, Snoredog, yours is so detailed & complete that I'll probably file it just in case I need it in the future. Very helpful.)

Thanks anyway.
Marsha

Songbird wrote:Whoosh, Goofproof, Mindy, BeanMeScot & Snoredog, I saw this on Saturday and didn't think I needed to say anything, but it keeps going. Folks, I posted my question more than three months ago. I don't know why it was resurrected, but it wasn't resurrected by me. If you're writing this info for me (and I'm not entirely sure if you are or if it's for somebody else in this thread), I appreciate it a lot, but I'm good to go. Consistently great leak rate, and my AHI usually hangs around 0.0 to 0.3. (Although, Snoredog, yours is so detailed & complete that I'll probably file it just in case I need it in the future. Very helpful.)

Thanks anyway.
Marsha

Sometimes we don't see the date because it is really small text, and well my eye's ain't all that good any more.

Now that you pointed it out to us, we are not going to be lemmings, we are going to be leaders.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRUK9cHFJ5s

Songbird wrote:Whoosh, Goofproof, Mindy, BeanMeScot & Snoredog, I saw this on Saturday and didn't think I needed to say anything, but it keeps going. Folks, I posted my question more than three months ago. I don't know why it was resurrected, but it wasn't resurrected by me. If you're writing this info for me (and I'm not entirely sure if you are or if it's for somebody else in this thread), I appreciate it a lot, but I'm good to go. Consistently great leak rate, and my AHI usually hangs around 0.0 to 0.3. (Although, Snoredog, yours is so detailed & complete that I'll probably file it just in case I need it in the future. Very helpful.)

Thanks anyway.
Marsha

So, how did the story end, Marsha?

echo wrote:So, how did the story end, Marsha?

Hi, Echo. It's been too long.

Well, this was an all-too-typical example of my trying to figure out how to take care of a problem that gave no evidence of even existing. If you went back to my first post, you will have noticed that I didn't even have any equipment at that point.

The end of the story is I'm using my nasal pillow mask without taping my mouth shut... clearly not a mouth breather.

The moral of the story, to put a bit of a twist on a thought of Mark Twain's, is that it's best to keep your mouth shut and appear to be clueless than to open it and remove all doubt.

Marsha