I have been on BiPAP since July 27 of this year (2024). I am experiencing a lot of aerophagia. I was also having a lot of mouth leak at times, which eased the aerophagia, but of course that caused other issues. I purchased a Knightsbridge chin strap to stop the mouth leak, and it seems to have fixed the leak issue. However, I'm back to having a lot of bad aerophagia. Last night, I woke up with such bad bloating and belching that I actually thew up.
My prescribed titrated pressures on BiPAP are 13/9, and I'm using a ResMed Aircurve 11. I think these are good numbers to help with the apnea, but maybe they are too high for my esophagus. I'm really clueless as to where to start with adjusting my pressures for aerophagia. I'm happy to try VAuto (auto adjusting BiPAP pressures) on the machine as well, but again, I don't know what values to start with.
I read on another thread that position could possibly make a difference with aerophagia as well. I sleep on both my right side and left side. I have not noticed if one side or the other causes more aerophagia, but I'll try to investigate that more if I can. I do sleep with two pillows to try to prop my head up a little. When I would sleep with only one pillow, the aerophagia would be present even with the mouth leak present. With two pillows, usually only the mouth leak was present. This leads me to believe that the aerophagia was worse with only one pillow, and so I've deduced that propping up helps ease the aerophagia. I came to this conclusion before fixing the mouth leak with the chin strap, so feel free to let me know if this idea is bonkers. Keep in mind that I was using two pillows when I woke up last night from the severe aerophagia. So, propping up on an extra pillow is not going to be enough by itself. I might try propping up even more to see if that helps, although it's really hard for me to sleep completely propped up.
Also, I am being treated for esophageal cancer. The cancer is in the lower portion of my esophagus, where the esophagus connects to my stomach. Not sure if this might make a difference, but I figured I'd mention it.
I've attached an OSCAR screenshot showing about 40 minutes of sleep last night before waking up because of the aerophagia. Thanks for any help!
- cyberfiche