oral appliances

[metropical]

somnomed
somnoguard
apnearx

any thoughts or experiences with these?

[PaulaO2]

If you do a search of the forum, you'll see a lot of threads about the first two. Opinions tend to lean toward "risks not worth it; no way to monitor efficiency".

http://www.apneaboard.com/forums/Thread-...rum-Search

[Dawnstar]

Have no experience with any of these, I went to an Endodontist (dentist who makes custom oral appliances), to have something made for me.

Long story short, it didn't work, my AHI was too high, and long term it was obvious it would have eventually caused my teeth to shift out of alignment.

I suspect unless your AHI is pretty low it probably won't help (mine was 33 at the time).

[CB91710]

Have no experience with any of these, I went to an Endodontist (dentist who makes custom oral appliances), to have something made for me.

Long story short, it didn't work, my AHI was too high, and long term it was obvious it would have eventually caused my teeth to shift out of alignment.

I suspect unless your AHI is pretty low it probably won't help (mine was 33 at the time).

My sleep study showed I was around 14 or 15...  marginal for writing a 'scrip for a machine.
I had previously tried an oral appliance and it was not effective.  It also created a serious TMJ condition...  I could not properly chew food for a couple of hours after getting up.

[Dawnstar]

That was also a problem for me as I already had moderate TMJ.

[metropical]

I have an AHI of 18.  I am concerned about the TMJ, but I was quite unsuccessful with the APAP.
Sure wish the Airing micro was available.

[CB91710]

I have an AHI of 18.  I am concerned about the TMJ, but I was quite unsuccessful with the APAP.
Sure wish the Airing micro was available.

Even if it did not violate the laws of physics and actually worked, the Airing would not do anything that an APAP does not already do.

[tomkatt]

I've not tried any of the ones you listed, but I've tried a few mouth guards in the past and all I got was a sore jaw in the morning for my trouble. I do have mild TMJ though, so YMMV.

IMO nothing is going to come close to the efficacy of a xPAP. If you want to use a chin strap or mouth guard in conjunction with a xPAP by all means give it a shot and track the results. But by itself I don't think a mouth guard is even a poor solution. It doesn't seem to help at all.

[Dawnstar]

IMO, to have any chance of success, you would need a custom appliance made by an endodontist.
They'll be able to adjust the jaw tension, but you need some way to measure the results, like a home sleep study.  It won't be cheap, but I tried it after my first failure with CPAP.

Why didn't APAP work for you? Perhaps exploring that would be more worthwhile.

[Marillion]

I would advise against the use of an oral appliance. My own dentist warned me against it even though they could have made some serious money on me.

I tried pretty much all of the best online adjustable and non adjustable ones. None of them worked and all I got for trying them was a modified bite for a few hours (sometimes most of the day) that made it practically impossible to chew properly.