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Bi-pap, going from full face mask to nasal pillows
Any tips? I'm not sure why he thinks I won't get a stuffy nose on nasal pillows like I do the full face mask, but I'm willing to try anything.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Mike on
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Generally, I'm a huge fan of nasal pillows over a full face mask if you can get the nasal pillows to work effectively for you. And that's a big if. I haven't been able to do it myself. For me, the nasal pillows became too easily dislodged as I moved around throughout the night. That said, the full face mask is a bummer. Too much mask. And it's notoriously prone to leaks. That said, not sure what any of this has to do with congestion. Perhaps others will know.
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Permalink Reply by gordon on
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HI SHELIA! Welcome to Sleepguide, I use this nasal pillow>
http://cpapplus.com/CPAP_Masks/Nasal_Pillow_Masks_1.html
Mirage I, they are showing Mirage II, which is also just a nasal tube to ur nose. Like I said to all here, if you
have nasal congestion, this may not be good for you,. I suggest you try the nasal pillow mask, with a chinstrap, which keeps your jaw from dropping at night. The stretchy one(i-piece slip-over-red) is what I use, and try it for a week.
Sometimes the sinus/nasal congestion is a topic to be discussed here in regards to a nasal-only or full (over both nose and mouth) recommendation. Good luck, and we hope to read your future posts.
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Permalink Reply by Shelia Shafer on
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In talking with my doctor, I told him the reason I don't use my mask is that about an hour or two into sleeping, my nose gets stopped up, I can't breathe, and I start clawing at the mask in my sleep to get it off. With the bipap full face mask, I feel like I'm on a ventilator. The other reason I don't use my bipap is from hurting after I lay down for a while (left hip, right shoulder). He says that if we can get me sleeping well, a lot of my "issues" will go away.
Otherwise, I spend most of the night in my wonderful chair, with an ottoman. But I know that isn't the best of situations either.
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I don't know what to make of this post. You cant wear the bipap, because you're feeling like on a vent(claustrophobic), and nasal only isn't an option due to nasal congestion, yet he says these issues will "go away" ? wtf?(don't ask me what that means, Shelia)
I'm thinking this doc needs to "go away". Anyone else ?
Shelia Shafer said:In talking with my doctor, I told him the reason I don't use my mask is that about an hour or two into sleeping, my nose gets stopped up, I can't breathe, and I start clawing at the mask in my sleep to get it off. With the bipap full face mask, I feel like I'm on a ventilator. The other reason I don't use my bipap is from hurting after I lay down for a while (left hip, right shoulder). He says that if we can get me sleeping well, a lot of my "issues" will go away.
Otherwise, I spend most of the night in my wonderful chair, with an ottoman. But I know that isn't the best of situations either.
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I welcome any thoughts or suggestions. I've got to do something about the fatigue and chronic pain. I see an allergist for my allergies and get a shot every week. It's helped a lot, but I still have this stopped up feeling when I lay down. About 5 years ago I had sinus surgery, a turbinectomy (sp?) and my deviated septum repaired. You'd think I'd have the best nose in town.
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Shelia. I'm not a doctor, but having your best interests in mind, I want to make sure that you have your heart checked, and maybe your lungs too, the cardiac-pulmonary, I think others here would agree, I assume the cardiac is part of your regular testing annually, this is just a suggestion, not to scare you in any way, but I think you have to rule out any problems here right "off the bat", that would be a condition possibly aggravating your therapy, in my humble opinion.
Shelia Shafer said:I welcome any thoughts or suggestions. I've got to do something about the fatigue and chronic pain. I see an allergist for my allergies and get a shot every week. It's helped a lot, but I still have this stopped up feeling when I lay down. About 5 years ago I had sinus surgery, a turbinectomy (sp?) and my deviated septum repaired. You'd think I'd have the best nose in town.
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Permalink Reply by RockRpsgt on
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I am not a big fan of nasal pillows. They seem to cause more headaches then they fix. Jnk is right though we do not know what your doc is thinking, and it may help with your sinus problems. The lt swift is nice. If you can go standard nasal I really like the resmed micro or the fisher paykel flex.
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Permalink Reply by bonesigh on
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This is an interesting post. Jnk mentions that many have trouble with sinus issues when starting therapy, yes, I did too. Now I use a ffm. I could now, due to finally being able to keep my mouth shut and my pressure being reduced, be able to wear a swift light nasal mask...which is sooo comfortable in comparison to the ffm. But, every time I wear it my nose get's plugged up.
I suggested to my doc that this was because my nose was not used to the direct hit, so to speak. I don't have a problem with nose congestion, rarely anyway, with the ffm. I truly believe that it's the direct pressure causing it because my nose is not used to it. My suggestion to the doc was to put me on a hybrid mask to get my nose used to it but, they only have one kind in the office and that one I tried long ago, and again just recently for I still had it around the house, and it presses uncomfortablely under my nose. They also did not think this was the problem and sent me to a "nose" doctor. Who basically said to me "Loose weight!" What a jerk. I'm doing the best I can!! I guess I need to just go out on a limb and start getting my own hybrids to try... but the cost! My husband just got a 400 dollar a month cut!
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Thanks for all the great suggestions and advice. Gordon - I had chest x-rays done in 2007 and again in the ER a couple of weeks ago. Everything was fine. Also have done a pulmonary function test and treadmill heart stress test last month. Both fine. I feel like it's something with my lungs, but they can't find anything, so.... I have LOTS of allergies and had asthma as a child. And I live and work in Dallas where the air quality is not good. jnk - I too go from side to side because of the hip and shoulder pain.
I had a full workup a year ago with this pulmonologist the day after my sister died, but I was in shock and didn't remember a lot of it. I called to get the results again and see if there was something we could do in way of a mask, and he started ordering this test and that test. I finally said whoa, what do you hope to gain from another sleep study, and described all my symptoms to his nurse. That's when I finally got a one-on-one, slower pace, talk to me kind of appointment. He finally showed me and explained the graphs from my sleep study which helped me understand a lot and I was able to go over all my symptoms with him. That's when he suggested the nasal pillows, as I've been custom fitted with three different full face masks. He also said I had a huge tongue and thought my tonsils were swollen. He was surprised to learn that my tonsils were removed when I was a kid. And I get a stuffy nose when I lay down - even without the mask or machine, so I feel like it's something in my physical makeup. The doctor also said, to my surprise - Cindy - that losing weight might help a little, but probably would not cure my particular sleep apnea. I get really tired of the lose weight and your life will be perfect routine.
I recently moved and am trying to arrange my bedroom so that I can have my machine between my bed and my chair so I can just up and move when I need to without a huge disruption of sleep.
My daughter told me for some time that I had sleep apnea, and I knew I snored. I went through two major surgeries and then this last time after major hernia surgery is when I met this doctor. No one before had ever taken it seriously or said anything about it. He's a board certified pulmonologist and critical care doctor, and to wake up from surgery with him hovering over me was kind of scary. Anyway, I've stuck with it, trying to figure it out and get better.
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"I'm beginning to think (and I may be alone on this) that being overweight is a symptom of sleep apnea rather than the cause."
What do you think the %s are Cindy? Lack of REM leads to eating disorders. With your insomnia are you overweight? You don't think that living in the fast food capital of the world has anything to do with America leading the world in apnea and obesity? Food for thought. HAH that's funny.
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yes i find things more humerous at night. I too have always been a big boy. Southern cooking and all. I find this topic interesting. The chicken or the egg topic that is. Not us being big. In my experience i see it about 50/50. I also find that alot of my skinnier pts tend to have some other obsessive compulsive disorder. drug or alcohol addiction are pretty high, manic depressive tendoncies, manic cleaners. i have found that treatment of SBD does help with most of these ailments leading me to believe that lack of deep sleep might cause an overall obsessive compulsive disorder. How that OCD manifest may purely be based on the psyche of the pt.
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Permalink Reply by amott1973 on
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I have a chronic stuffy nose, and breathe through my mouth nearly all the time, so I was sure I would need a full face mask or at least a chin strap. But turned out that the swift nasal pillow masks somehow push in enough air that I don't breathe through my mouth at night! I was really surprised by this myself, but maybe jnk has it right, that the pressure is increased enough with a nasal pillow mask to get the passages to open up a bit.
Also, you can try those Breathe Right nasal strips too. Those worked for me back before I had a mask (of course they didn't help the apneas though). No reason not to use them along with a mask.
the other thing I wanted to mention was the back/hip pain. I find that with my mask on I sleep so deeply that I don't move much in my sleep. This leads to some major pains when I wake up. Sometimes it's actually the pain that will wake me up instead of my alarm clock. Sleeping in a recliner does help sometimes with my back pain. My mom has the same thing, and does as you suggest, having her chair and bed adjacent to each other with a nightstand and the cpap between them. Then she can move between them at night as needed.
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