After around 30 days of use, she pulled it out, and although it showed no serious amount of captured dust/pollen issues, she gently hand rinsed it out sans soap, in luke-warm running water. Then placed it on a paper towel until it dried out. It showed no sign of distress, or loss of of its form. She replaced it in the unit, and it seems to be working just fine. We may repeat the process at least once more before replacing it with a new one.
The extra cost of buying the filters isn't so bad if one can use them for longer periods of time. And they do seem to filter better than the standard ones.
Her AHI's are still mostly 1's and 2's, and a few occasionally in the 3 to 4 range....
Sleep well y'all!
FLc