Breathing worsening

[astro]

At last we have a diagnosis and how quickly since then has my mum started to decline. Today she is worried that she is unable to swallow at all, and tells me (well writes me) that she is not breathing well. I understand there is cpap,is that the same at bpap, and what can she use throughtout the day to assist her to breathe easier?
Does o2 help?

 

[chriss]

Hi Astro,

Bipap is different to CPAP. The air flow with CPAP is continuous. Bipap is considered non invasive ventilation and involves the person wearing a mask with a hose attached to a machine that pressurises air in and then drops the pressure to allow you to exhale. It is a two stage process. From what I understand , in ALS your lungs work fine but the diaphragm is weak and so the bipap helps do some of the work of the diaphragm muscle. My husband is on his pretty much all day and night. I don't know how the process works in NZ but even when my husbands breathing started to get much worse we could not get a machine until they did a sleep study and the study was reported on. It got to the stage while waiting weeks and weeks for the report to be done that he was sitting up in the chair all night because he could not breathe laying down. So I got him to him to complain to the hospitals patient advocate and guess what, the report was done that day. Then we moved the appointment up to see the respiratory doctor and then we got booked in for the fitting of the mask and machine. So all in all it was not a speedy process. Also as far as I know O2 is not helpful.

Thanks

Chris

 

[alex scared]

hi there . . C pap tends to be prescribed to people with sleep apnea. . As stated above its continuous positive airway pressure. . As far as i am aware it does not actually assist weakened breathing muscles . . I believe a bi pap does help with this thoug and is usually helpful when breathing becomes an issue . . Hope that helps . . Alex

 

[joelc]

A bipap is the correct machine for a PALS. As far as O2 use, read this. http://www.lifewithals.com/page5.html