Sierra

I agree. Regular cleaning is the secret. If you use distilled water or demineralized water the risk of contamination is probably even higher. While these products are likely sterile when you buy them, as soon as you open the lid, you are susceptible to contamination. These products are very pure, and usually do not contain chlorine, chloramine, or ozone to prevent growth if contaminated. Similar issue with filtered water from Brita machines. The activated carbon in the filter takes out the chlorine and/or chloramine.

Perhaps you could give a bit more detail on what brand and model your original machine was, and the one you have now. Also which mask are you using? The number of 400 for pressure does not make sense. The standard unit of measure for CPAP pressure is centimeters of water, and often is just referred to as cm. It is metric measure, and I believe used pretty much around the world. A standard CPAP machine will deliver from 4 to 20 cm of water pressure. A BiPAP will typically go a little higher to 25 cm. If you post the make and model of your machine perhaps someone here can help you get the actual pressure settings from it. That would be very helpful.

I have attempted to fix my wife's Mirage FX mask which broke at the strap attachment clip. I first tried silicone as I thought that would be flexible and not break. However, it was not strong enough, and did break almost immediately. Also it takes a long time to set up. Then I tried Gorilla crazy glue, and it was relatively successful. She wore it for a while, and now keeps it as a spare.

You might want to consider buying some F20 parts yourself to keep as emergency spares and not tell them about it. While it seems in the US you need a prescription to get a full mask, you are able to buy parts without one. Some apparently just buy all the parts and put them together themselves to get a complete mask. There are many places to go, but here is a link to CPAP.com. The silicone mask cushion is $54, while the complete mask assembly without headgear, is $118. If you added the headgear it would be another $31, and you would have a complete mask. However it sounds like all you really need is the cushion...

AirFit F20 Assembly Kit

One more thought. The F20 comes in two versions. The AirFit version uses a silicone cushion. The same mask frame can be used with the memory foam cushion, and then I believe it is called the AirTouch. Some like the memory foam, and some do not. Many report it is not durable and easily tears. If you have the memory foam type, you may want to go with the silicone cushion for better durability.

The manufacturer recommends against using stuff like Vaseline on the mask, and claim it causes the cushion to deteriorate. I just keep mine clean. I have the F20 with silicone, but was not able to get it to stop leaking, so I am afraid I am not a good one to give advice on that aspect...

Some sleep with a soft cervical collar to keep their neck aligned. Futuro is one brand available here at places like Walmart.

Chris, that is a very inspirational post. Welcome to the site.

I can't figure out how to post my own SleepyHead images at this site, or I would show you a graphics screen from SleepyHead that shows what air loss from an open mouth looks like. I use the same mask as you, and do have mouth leaks. I did a quick search in Google for images that might be representative of a mouth leak. What I found is a SleepyHead daily report screenshot that shows what major leaks look like (gray highlighted areas). These leaks are really bad, and the mask may even be coming right off. That said mouth leaks look similar but lower in magnitude in my experience. They have flat tops and max out in the 30-35 L/min range, not 95 like in this example. What SleepyHead does is show you what happens all night from second to second. It is much more revealing than a single set of summary data, showing the average leakage rate. Summary data is good to flag that there is a problem, but not so good in diagnosing what the root cause is.

SleepyHead Example of Excessive Leakage

If you want to confirm for sure that the issue is mouth leaks, I would suggest using the chin strap, and also taping your mouth shut. Sounds awful, but I do it every night using 3M millipore paper tape. Some will say it is a risky thing to do. What happens if your throw up in the night? My answer is what happens if you throw up in the night when wearing a full face mask, and fill the mask with vomit? You plug your nose and your mouth. Either way not pleasant. I use about a 4" strip of 1" tape, and fold over the last 1/4" or so to make a non adhesive tab that I can use to easily pull the tape off, if I have to in a hurry. I never have. I do wake up in the night sometimes and wonder why I can't open my mouth though!!

What manufacturer and model of mask are you using? If it is a nasal, or nasal pillow mask, could you be opening your mouth and letting air out that way? If you download and install SleepyHead, you can get a lot more detail. When you look at the graph of leakage through the night you will get a lot better idea what is going on. The typical mouth leak is high and has a flat level top. See link below.

SleepyHead Download

Yep, I have all the same numbers/dates. Probably not a SleepyHead issue.

It may come down to working up the nerve to delete existing data, and hope the new data is saved properly. Not sure it applies with F&P machines, but with ResMed, the machine itself does not save detailed data, only summary data. If you have issues with the removable data storage media, no detailed data is stored. With ResMed if you stick in a new or blank SD card it will format it and start saving data again from scratch. That may be another option to try.

I used a F&P SleepStyle machine for a couple of weeks as a trial machine. It is the new one that supersedes the Icon. It was not compatible with SleepyHead. I returned it in any case. However, I understand that SleepyHead is supposed to support the older Icon+ machines with the USB stick. What version of SleepyHead do you have? The one I have has been downloaded from this site. I think some have had issues with the version downloaded from the Sourceforge site.

SleepyHead Download

I tried to find you a Clinician Guide for this CPAP, but failed to find a good one. I did find a YouTube video on how to use the Clinician Menu on the Icon Plus. It may be of some help. What you might want to consider is finding an option to delete all the user data and start fresh. Most machines have this option to use in case the machine is sold. I found this in another forum as an answer on how to delete user data. It may be of some help.

How to use Clinician Menu on Icon Plus

"But in the clinician's menu, turn the large outer ring so that the cursor is at the bottom dot. (6 O'clock), Press the centre button then turn the outer ring to the specific data you wish to erase. Press the centre button then using the outer ring reduce each value to zero. You will need to be careful not to erase data you should keep. Hope this is of help. Can't be more specific as I don't want to damage my data experimenting."

I suffer from not being able to go to sleep as fast as I want at times. And, I also know what it is like to become agitated when fighting with the mask to get comfortable and stop the leaks. After trying 4 different masks I have found the AirFit P10 to be the best for comfort. It is not perfect, but I have made peace with it, and generally find it comfortable. Another issue that I was a bit slow to pick up on, and my initial provider did not help me much, was the start pressure. This is the pressure your mask initially starts at. Mine was set too low, and I was not getting enough air during the going to sleep period of the night. It was initially set at 4 cm. I now have it set at 8.4 cm with an EPR setting of 3. However, I only use the EPR during this initial time before going to sleep.

A while back I stumbled onto the website at the link below. It was started by a pharmacist in Canada, that is also a professor at the univeristy. I suspect it is probably a grad student project of some kind. It is a little disorganized, but I still have found it helpful. The website was inspired by the belief that too many people use sleeping pills and it may cause more harm than good. I don't find anything for sale at the site, and apparently he is not concerned about selling fewer sleeping pills at his pharmacy either. He promotes the use of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Insomnia or CBTi. The link takes you to a page where there is a series of points worth opening and reading. There are also 4 tools to access your sleep in the right sidebar. They are helpful in checking your beliefs about insomnia vs current research. A few of my conclusions was that I was trying to sleep too long (9-10 hours a night). 7-8 hours is the recommended total sleep in the day. I also was in the habit of taking naps during the day, and that is not helpful either, even if you had a poor sleep the night before. In any case here is the link. Hope it helps some,

MySleepWell.ca