Using a chin strap with nasal pillows

[sean_david1]

I am a 3 year vet with a BiPap unit but have recently been having problems with mouth leaks. I am not a candidate for FFM so please don't suggest them. I tried the chin strap and it works to a point but I also do not have any teeth/dentures (long story) so after a while, I get jaw pains and headaches using the strap. It seems to be hyper-extending my jaw (years without teeth allows you to hyper-extend anyway). The root issue is I am upgrading to a vent and want to continue with my pillows but I need some sort of spacer to prevent the jaw issues! Any suggestions?

[ChicagoGranny]

Have you ever considered taping your lips? https://www.amazon.com/s?k=sleep+tape&c ... _sb_noss_1

[Pugsy]

Does taping the mouth shut freak you out too much?

Have you seen the Scunci trick?
viewtopic.php?p=1089718&f=1&t=112758&p= ... s#p1086296
Look for the post by Jay Aitchsee

Some people have decent luck with a soft cervical collar propping the chin up and helping reduce mouth breathing.

[Jlfinkels]

To quote Pugsy’s sage advice to me years ago: If the leaks are within the tolerance of the machine and don’t bother you, then you may not need to worry about them. If the leaks are above the machine tolerance then it impacts the machines ability to treat the apnea events. (Hope I am remembering this correctly but if not I’m sure I’ll be corrected)

As she said in her response, a soft cervical collar does the trick for some of us. Some use a collar and also scunci’s. And some use tape as Granny said. I tried chinstraps and had to winch it down so hard I could not sleep well, so the collar was a good choice for me.

Give a things a try for a few nights and see how it works for you.

[sean_david1]

Have you ever considered taping your lips? https://www.amazon.com/s?k=sleep+tape&c ... _sb_noss_1

Unfortunately, this is not an option! I have a moustache and goatee to conceal the dental issue.

[sean_david1]

Never thought of using a Scuncii I will give this a try!

Wow! I have never posted on a BB where replies were so rapid and useful. Thanks a million to all!

[Pugsy]

To quote Pugsy’s sage advice to me years ago: If the leaks are within the tolerance of the machine and don’t bother you, then you may not need to worry about them. If the leaks are above the machine tolerance then it impacts the machines ability to treat the apnea events. (Hope I am remembering this correctly but if not I’m sure I’ll be corrected)

No correction needed. That is indeed what I usually suggest when people are concerned about mouth opening or breathing leaks.
Any leak that disturbs our sleep, no matter how teeny tiny or massive, needs to be work on but from the "it's disturbing my sleep" aspect of things and not necessarily effect on therapy aspect.

Leaks that we sleep through that are within the machine's ability to compensate for...I ignore...these are below large leak territory.

Leaks that we sleep through that are venturing into large leak territory I will look closely at the duration and how deep it goes into large leak territory before I start worrying about them and go looking to try something to reduce them because they MIGHT be a negative impact on therapy itself.
So duration and just how deep into large leak territory is a critical detail that I look at when deciding whether or not to work on it by trying the other common mouth shutting measures. 10 minutes of massive leak...not a big deal and I shrug my shoulders and move on but 2 or 3 hours deep into large leak territory is going to be a different story. I will look closer...may not do anything depending on what I see but I will at least look.

The reason I didn't give the above speech with the OP here was that he wasn't asking for me to evaluate however much leak he was seeing in terms of need to do something.....he just wanted ideas for keeping the mouth shut.
Simple question...simple answer.
Now if he was to come back here and says he tried everything and it just didn't work and he already has said he doesn't want to go down the full face mask road then we could maybe discuss just how bad his leaks were and did they disturb sleep or not with the mouth breathing, etc. We could take the additional time to really see just how critical it might nor might not be to keep the mouth totally sealed all night or not.

Or if he just comes back here and tells us..."really, you mean I might not need to do anything"....then we look more closely at "do the leaks from whatever cause wake ups" and "are they prolonged and far enough into large leak territory that we can't trust the AHI numbers"....we can for sure look more closely.

[zonker]

Never thought of using a Scuncii I will give this a try!

Wow! I have never posted on a BB where replies were so rapid and useful. Thanks a million to all!

we are mainly a bunch of old farts with nothing better to do!

here's a link the the scunci system as proposed by jayaichsee-
viewtopic.php?p=1089718&f=1&t=112758&p= ... s#p1086296

i use this system, slightly modified. but i ALSO use the firm foam cervical collar as jlfinkels suggested.

good luck!

[Pugsy]

I have never posted on a BB where replies were so rapid and useful.

Sunday afternoon....home and it's too friggin hot to go anywhere or do anything.

[zonker]

Give a things a try for a few nights and see how it works for you.

hey, bud. good to see you. was wondering where you'd gotten to.

[sean_david1]

To quote Pugsy’s sage advice to me years ago: If the leaks are within the tolerance of the machine and don’t bother you, then you may not need to worry about them. If the leaks are above the machine tolerance then it impacts the machines ability to treat the apnea events. (Hope I am remembering this correctly but if not I’m sure I’ll be corrected)

No correction needed. That is indeed what I usually suggest when people are concerned about mouth opening or breathing leaks.
Any leak that disturbs our sleep, no matter how teeny tiny or massive, needs to be work on but from the "it's disturbing my sleep" aspect of things and not necessarily effect on therapy aspect.

Leaks that we sleep through that are within the machine's ability to compensate for...I ignore...these are below large leak territory.

Leaks that we sleep through that are venturing into large leak territory I will look closely at the duration and how deep it goes into large leak territory before I start worrying about them and go looking to try something to reduce them because they MIGHT be a negative impact on therapy itself.
So duration and just how deep into large leak territory is a critical detail that I look at when deciding whether or not to work on it by trying the other common mouth shutting measures. 10 minutes of massive leak...not a big deal and I shrug my shoulders and move on but 2 or 3 hours deep into large leak territory is going to be a different story. I will look closer...may not do anything depending on what I see but I will at least look.

The reason I didn't give the above speech with the OP here was that he wasn't asking for me to evaluate however much leak he was seeing in terms of need to do something.....he just wanted ideas for keeping the mouth shut.
Simple question...simple answer.
Now if he was to come back here and says he tried everything and it just didn't work and he already has said he doesn't want to go down the full face mask road then we could maybe discuss just how bad his leaks were and did they disturb sleep or not with the mouth breathing, etc. We could take the additional time to really see just how critical it might nor might not be to keep the mouth totally sealed all night or not.

Or if he just comes back here and tells us..."really, you mean I might not need to do anything"....then we look more closely at "do the leaks from whatever cause wake ups" and "are they prolonged and far enough into large leak territory that we can't trust the AHI numbers"....we can for sure look more closely.

Pugsy,

I live with very high pressures (16-19) so when a leak happens, there is no return! lol. I wake with my mouth wide open and a tornado of wind coming out. Dry mouth does not describe the status of what was an oral cavity. More like death valley! I went for three years without any real issues or changes to my settings. Covid Diagnosis and recovery has now forced a change in my sleep assist (not yet happened) due to many factors. From what i understand so far is the vent will be on very similar settings but the inhale time will be longer forcing my lungs to open and get rid of the building Co2.

[Jlfinkels]

hey, bud. good to see you. was wondering where you'd gotten to.

Thanks mate, good to be back. Work was insane for a bit and had a lot of international trips (all with my CPAP), so never had much time to get back onto the site. Back to my usual domestic travel with limited international visits, so can stop in more often.

Good to hear from you and hope all is well.

[Pugsy]

I live with very high pressures (16-19) so when a leak happens, there is no return! lol. I wake with my mouth wide open and a tornado of wind coming out. Dry mouth does not describe the status of what was an oral cavity. More like death valley!

Understood and I assumed that you probably wouldn't be wanting to seal the mouth without a good reason and I figured that the leak probably wakes you up and causes desert mouth which can also disturb sleep.
That's why I didn't go into the "do you really need to keep the mouth shut" thing.
Especially since you have been on cpap for a while...now if new to cpap might be a different story.

Give the scuncii thing a try. They are cheap and it might work out just fine. Sure worth trying.

Sorry to hear that the Covid has really done a number on your lungs. Hopefully the vent need will be short lived.
I wish you the best.