How much does it leak when you open your mouth?

rested gal wrote:I think that's going to be the key to good cpap treatment for you, Brent, no matter what machine you use or what type of machine. Mouth air leaks can be a real treatment-buster. (pssst.... tape...)

Agreed. However, it's gonna have to be with a full-face mask or something other than taping. In all seriousness, I would do without treatment before I would tape my mouth closed. It's like trying to make a cow walk down stairs, some things just go against nature and for me having my mouth taped closed is one of them.

With your mouth open, it's a moot point whether you snore or not... at least with my mouth it is: the air pouring out is causing my palate to vibrate, flap actually, in a pretty unpleasant way.

Took me 8 months to decide to stand in front of the mirror and put tape with pull off tabs on my mouth. And then it took me about 8 seconds to see that cows do walk downstairs (how did you get them upstairs, by the way?)

A full face mask probably takes much longer to take off than the tape, when you're in a hurry.

O.

ozij,

It's one of those mysteries. A cow will indeed walk up stairs if you lead it carefully. But no matter what you do, it ain't walking back down. That was the jumping-off point for one of the all-time classic episodes of Hill Street Blues when they apprehended a thief preparing to slaughter a stolen cow on the top floor of an abandoned building.

A cow ain't got no down genes!

and then a police helicopter got involved and the rest is a spoiler.

I don't have any more time to spend looking at this right now but I've found examples of at least two kinds of leak/apnea sequences, sometimes in the same night. The kind I initially described is a period of leakage greater than 0.5L/sec (30L/hour) with two or more apneas and some hypopneas in the final minute or two before the leak returns to normal (presumably I close my mouth). So the mouth leak seems to end with some obstructive events resulting in an awakening. That's what I expected to see.

But the other kind has the leakage period which ends (once again, I'm presuming the leak occurs while my mouth is partly open) but the multiple apneas and hypopneas come two or three minutes after the leakage returns to normal. For example, on the night of March 28 my leak rate jumped to 0.46L/sec at 1:50AM and continued increasing to a peak of 0.76L/sec at 2:09AM, remaining high until 2:15AM but abruptly returning to a normal leakage of 0.10L/sec at 2:16AM and stayed there from then on.

Here's the thing...I had a few scattered hypopneas during the leak event but then starting at 2:17AM (two minutes after the presumptive mouth closing) the worst period of obstructive events happens. Here's a log of the whole period:

• 1:46AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=8.4
  1:47AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=8.4
  1:48AM Leak=0.20, Pressure=8.4
  1:49AM Leak=0.30, Pressure=8.2 (1 Hypop, 13-sec Apnea)
  1:50AM Leak=0.46, Pressure=8.2 (1 Hypop)
  1:51AM Leak=0.58, Pressure=8.4
  1:52AM Leak=0.64, Pressure=8.8
  1:53AM Leak=0.66, Pressure=8.6 (1 Hypop)
  1:54AM Leak=0.66, Pressure=8.6
  1:55AM Leak=0.66, Pressure=8.6 (2 Hypops)
  1:56AM Leak=0.68, Pressure=8.4
  1:57AM Leak=0.68, Pressure=8.4
  1:58AM Leak=0.70, Pressure=8.4
  1:59AM Leak=0.70, Pressure=8.4
  2:00AM Leak=0.70, Pressure=8.2
  2:01AM Leak=0.70, Pressure=8.2
  2:02AM Leak=0.72, Pressure=8.2
  2:03AM Leak=0.72, Pressure=8.2
  2:04AM Leak=0.74, Pressure=8.2
  2:05AM Leak=0.74, Pressure=8.0
  2:06AM Leak=0.74, Pressure=8.0 (1 Hypop)
  2:07AM Leak=0.74, Pressure=8.0
  2:08AM Leak=0.74, Pressure=8.0
  2:09AM Leak=0.76, Pressure=8.0
  2:10AM Leak=0.76, Pressure=7.8
  2:11AM Leak=0.70, Pressure=7.8
  2:12AM Leak=0.72, Pressure=7.8 (1 Hypop)
  2:13AM Leak=0.70, Pressure=7.8
  2:14AM Leak=0.72, Pressure=7.8 (1 Hypop)
  2:15AM Leak=0.56, Pressure=7.6 (1 Hypop)
  2:16AM Leak=0.10, Pressure=7.6
  2:17AM Leak=0.10, Pressure=7.6 (2 Hypops, 12-sec Apnea, 13-sec Apnea)
  2:18AM Leak=0.10, Pressure=7.6 (1 Hypop)
  2:19AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=7.9 (2 Hypops)
  2:20AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=8.4
  2:21AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=8.6 (2 Hypops, 10-sec Apnea)
  2:22AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=8.6 (15-sec Apnea)
  2:23AM Leak=0.12, Pressure=8.6
  2:24AM Leak=0.14, Pressure=9.6
  2:25AM I woke up and turned the machine off to go to the bathroom

There are other 30-45 minute periods with this same pattern on other nights. The long leaks seem to have apneas/hypopnea after the leak is over while shorter, more abrupt leaks are terminated by apneas and hyponeas (otherwise, presumably they would have been longer leak events). Fascinating stuff.

i agree with brent. i would try almost anything else rather than tape my mouth shut. if it means full-face mask, so be it. that sounds better to me than activa and tape. everyone is different, and i could change my mind. call it hauntings from my childhood, but taped mouth really bothers me.

caroline

chdurie2 wrote:i agree with brent. i would try almost anything else rather than tape my mouth shut. if it means full-face mask, so be it. that sounds better to me than activa and tape. everyone is different, and i could change my mind. call it hauntings from my childhood, but taped mouth really bothers me.

caroline

cariline,

I think I'm the opposite... I'd rather sew my lips closed than have to use a FF mask.

wading thru the muck! wrote:I think I'm the opposite... I'd rather sew my lips closed than have to use a FF mask.

Wader,

Now THAT'S what I would call an effective weight loss program, too! After a couple weeks (or so), you wouldn't need CPAP at all!

I guess that's why there's so many varieties of "interfaces".....most of which I can't visualize myself using. Hopefully, there's something that will work for each and every user.

Take care,

Den

chdurie2 wrote:i agree with brent. i would try almost anything else rather than tape my mouth shut. if it means full-face mask, so be it. that sounds better to me than activa and tape. everyone is different, and i could change my mind. call it hauntings from my childhood, but taped mouth really bothers me.

Yep, a couple of weeks ago I was saying the exact same thing..... but, now, I have joined the ranks of the mouth tapers. The chin straps drove me nuts. There are enough straps and 'stuff' on my head. Taping is minimal, and easy to get used to and allow me to use masks other than full face masks. My stats are much better with mouth taped and nasal pillow interface that with any of the FF masks I tried.

I am a convert. Never thought I would hear my self say it. Whatever works!!

wading thru the muck! wrote:I'd rather sew my lips closed than have to use a FF mask.

Reading that almost sends shivers down my spine . . .

I thought long and hard about mouth taping and caution won out. Since I can sleep through some long apneas and since my sinuses regularly totally clog up, it struck me that with this combination mouth taping could be deadly.

Fortunately for me, after a couple of months of using nasal interfaces, mouth breathing doesn't seem to be much of an issue any more.

Regards,
Bill