strange question (re CPAP machine water)

So my husband sleeps with a c-pak, and it takes distilled water. Is there anyway I can know if the CL or SM would supply a bit of distilled water for it. Otherwise we have to lug it around>

I think your only chance for replenishment would be a grocery store or drug store close to WAS Union Station during your 6½ hour layover between trains. I think.

It's also not the end of the world if you use a bit of bottled water, or even tap.

I'm actually lazy and just use tap water all of the time without ill effects.

blackpup said:

So my husband sleeps with a c-pak, and it takes distilled water. Is there anyway I can know if the CL or SM would supply a bit of distilled water for it. Otherwise we have to lug it around>

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I know the medical supply people tell you not to, and I don't want to give you bad advice, but I'm wondering if you couldn't get away with tap water for just one or two nights.

I use distilled water in my machines at home, but use tap water when traveling and it doesn't seem to do them any harm.

Apparently we all think alike at the same time.....

The concern is primarily just mineral build-up over time, right? But the tank is changed every x months anyway, so I don't really see what the problem is.

Amtrak doesn't use distilled water onboard for anything that I know of and they don't have any.

I carry distilled water with me in a little stainless drinking water container (which I never drink out of). I only fill the CPAP reservoir 1/2 full to prevent it sloshing too much on the train. Since the little container only holds enough for about 4 nights, once I get where I am going I buy a regular 1/2 gallon jug of distilled water, use it there, refill my little container for the return journey and leave the rest of the jug.

The real mineral build up over time issue isn't with the tank (or the CPAP machine itself). It is with your lungs.

blackpup said:

So my husband sleeps with a c-pak, and it takes distilled water. Is there anyway I can know if the CL or SM would supply a bit of distilled water for it. Otherwise we have to lug it around>

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It'll be fine with ordinary bottled water for a few nights. Basically non-distilled water is fine. It eventually wrecks the tank due to limescale, though, and this does happen while the rest of the machine is perfectly intact. And then if you try to clean off the limescale with vinegar or whatever, the tank starts dissolving into the water, and that's not so good either, because there is stuff in the tank plastic which you probably don't want to breathe.

Look, what the CPAP does is to heat the water so that it evaporates, so that you breathe in moist air instead of dry air. It's just like any home vaporizer or a hot shower. The key point here is that *the minerals do not, on the whole, vaporize*; they instead deposit at the bottom of the CPAP machine. This is why they tell you to use distilled water. But for two nights on the train it doesn't matter one whit.

zephyr17 said:

Amtrak doesn't use distilled water onboard for anything that I know of and they don't have any.

I carry distilled water with me in a little stainless drinking water container (which I never drink out of). I only fill the CPAP reservoir 1/2 full to prevent it sloshing too much on the train. Since the little container only holds enough for about 4 nights, once I get where I am going I buy a regular 1/2 gallon jug of distilled water, use it there, refill my little container for the return journey and leave the rest of the jug.

The real mineral build up over time issue isn't with the tank (or the CPAP machine itself). It is with your lungs.

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This is a myth. The minerals do not, on the whole, make it into the air at all, unless you're using really weird water with minerals which do evaporate (I wouldn't use sulfur-dioxide-heavy water). The CPAP is attempting to have air which is about as moist as ordinary comfortable summer (high humidity) air, which is full of ordinary evaporated water -- the air you breathe the rest of the time probably has the same mineral content.

neroden said:

zephyr17 said:

Amtrak doesn't use distilled water onboard for anything that I know of and they don't have any.

I carry distilled water with me in a little stainless drinking water container (which I never drink out of). I only fill the CPAP reservoir 1/2 full to prevent it sloshing too much on the train. Since the little container only holds enough for about 4 nights, once I get where I am going I buy a regular 1/2 gallon jug of distilled water, use it there, refill my little container for the return journey and leave the rest of the jug.

The real mineral build up over time issue isn't with the tank (or the CPAP machine itself). It is with your lungs.

Click to expand...

This is a myth. The minerals do not, on the whole, make it into the air at all, unless you're using really weird water with minerals which do evaporate (I wouldn't use sulfur-dioxide-heavy water).

Click to expand...

I'm not sure what was up with the water at my old house, but every time I used tap water in my humidifier, the room would end up coated with thick, white dust. After sleeping with the humidifier near my face for a week, I ended up with a horrible, seemingly-nonstop asthma attack that had me in the ER for nebulizer treatments seven days straight.

I finally put two and two together and switched to distilled water in the humidifier. My lungs cleared up within two days, and I didn't see the thick, white dust anymore. My boyfriend and I joked that it was like Black Lung, only white instead.

Any ideas? I figured it was our water, since it always left a white crust (much like road salt on your pant legs) when it evaporated from a vase or glass.

SarahZ said:

I'm not sure what was up with the water at my old house, but every time I used tap water in my humidifier, the room would end up coated with thick, white dust. After sleeping with the humidifier near my face for a week, I ended up with a horrible, seemingly-nonstop asthma attack that had me in the ER for nebulizer treatments seven days straight.

I finally put two and two together and switched to distilled water in the humidifier. My lungs cleared up within two days, and I didn't see the thick, white dust anymore. My boyfriend and I joked that it was like Black Lung, only white instead.

Any ideas? I figured it was our water, since it always left a white crust (much like road salt on your pant legs) when it evaporated from a vase or glass.

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Many humidifiers, especially the cheapies they sell for home medical use, don't actually evaporate the water...they spray out a fine mist of it which (they hope!) will soon evaporate. But if your water is full of crud, that fine mist will carry the particles of crud.

I can't speak to all CPAP machines, but my own actually does evaporate the water...there is a small heater below the tank which warms it so that it evaporates into the air stream. So, if yours is like mine, there should be no issue from crud getting into your breathing air.

You still have the issue of crud building up in the tank as the water evaporates. As a stationary engineer (boiler operator), I can tell you that the answer to that problem is "blowdown". If you empty out the used water before the crud in it gets so concentrated that it begins to precipitate out and refill with clean water, you'll never crud up your tank. This works with regular tap water and Amtrak drinking water. The secret is to flush it out and refill it regularly...like, every night while you are using the tap water. (Distilled water is so pure that, if you're using it, you can run the tank bone-dry without ever precipitating out crud.) So, if you're on a trip of two or three days (or even two weeks, like my own Railfan Madness Part II last September), it doesn't hurt to use Amtrak's drinking water as long as you flush your tank out and refill it every night. Voice of experience.

ehbowen said:

Many humidifiers, especially the cheapies they sell for home medical use, don't actually evaporate the water...they spray out a fine mist of it which (they hope!) will soon evaporate. But if your water is full of crud, that fine mist will carry the particles of crud.

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Thank you. That makes sense.

While it's a good humidifier that can crank the fog in my room up to "Hound of the Baskervilles" level, it's still a store-bought "cheapie". I believe I bought it at Walgreens for about $30.

Also depends where you live, my tap water is very soft, where my sister lives it is so bad they had to have a water softening system installed in the house. Disgusting taste, mineral deposits on every faucet, and impossible to wash in.

I just take along a water bottle I bought at Wally World. I taped a label on saying "Distilled Water". I fill it when I leave home and it is good for 3-4 days if I pour the unused contents back in the bottle or 2-3 if I don't. Any water left over, I use for drinking.

niemi24s said:

I think your only chance for replenishment would be a grocery store or drug store close to WAS Union Station during your 6½ hour layover between trains. I think.

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There's a Walgreens in the basement of WAS Union Sta. I suspect they stock distilled water.

Since we fly so often, I took off the humidifier for travel. Try it at home first and you may be pleasantly surprised. In fact, I no longer use that part at all. Just got a new CPAP and made sure I got one that I could REMOVE the tank and it would still work fine.

When I was using it on the road, I just did tap water. Do not get hung up on that distilled water thing.

cruisegary said:

Since we fly so often, I took off the humidifier for travel. Try it at home first and you may be pleasantly surprised. In fact, I no longer use that part at all. Just got a new CPAP and made sure I got one that I could REMOVE the tank and it would still work fine. When I was using it on the road, I just did tap water. Do not get hung up on that distilled water thing.

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The primary reason for recommending distilled water is that it's safer for people who suffer from a weakened immune system and for healthy people who live in or travel through areas where parasites and other contaminants may exist in the water supply. Nasal passages have a more direct and potentially more harmful access to the bloodstream. Do not get hung up on that binary logic thing.

I use "reverse osmosis" water at home although I'm not too concerned about it either way. Mine can also be used with the water chamber empty.
Contrary to recommendations, I leave the whole thing at home while on trips. Still sleep pretty good.

Another reason for distilled water is that chemical buildup typically found in humidifiers is non-existent. In nearly 15 years with multiple CPAP machines, I've never had a problem.
I just bring enough water for the train or just don't run the humidifier while I'm on it. You can usually find a gallon of distilled water at any grocery, pharmacy, Wal-mart or many other stores for under $1. It also makes the best drinking water to help use up the excess. And based on news reports of bad chemicals in some drinking water, the safest.