If most of you are like me, after a while you don't notice changes to the posts that are stickied, up above.  I happened to go look at one of them, and saw a good question, that I had missed.

It is a question that BMonee asked about why the 3 liter bag on the O2PTIMASK^TM.

It is (in my humble opinion) a very valid question, that others have also questioned, so I wanted to repost the answer that Batch and I generated, in a spot where more people might see it.


Quote:

DJ wrote on Feb 9th, 2009 at 8:09pm: BMoneeTheMoneeMan wrote on Feb 9th, 2009 at 1:31am: Why on earth would they put such a small bag on it, though? B, The bag may look small, but I think it's quite efficient.  The 3 liter bag works pretty well from what I'm hearing from the experts like Chuck.  Chuck, or anyone who's used the 3 liter bag, care to chime in? Sorry for the delay in answering this post.  I missed it. In talking with our resident oxygen guru, Batch, he and I collaborated with the following answer: The reason that the 3 liter bag works so well is that your lungs can usually only take in around 3 liters of air during a maximum inhale.  Yes, your lungs hold more than 3 liters, the average adult lung capacity is about 5 liters.   In your normal abort method, (using one of those cheap disposable masks at only 15 LPM) you will only be pulling in around 1 liters of oxygen, per inhale.  That is only 20% of your normal lung capacity.  So with the 3 liter bag, you are up to 60% with a maximum inhale, which gives you a much greater ventilation of the lung. The goal of this therapy is to cast off CO2 faster than your body is producing it.  This is the main idea behind hyperventilating, with the higher flow rate and 3 liter bag. When you are just sitting there, watching TV, or surfing the net, you are only taking in about 1/2 to 3/4 a liter of air, at a time. I hope this answers your question. BTW, Deej now has his resupply of masks, so those that were waiting, he has them on hand now. Chuck

I recently switched to the O2PTI and 3 liter bag and can testify that it made a difference of day and night for me.

The standard Non-reabreather mask with it's 1 liter bag would calapse (deflate) on me during the panic and desparate breathing during a hard attack. Too many times this caused more panic and a failure to abort.

For me breathing the O2 as deeply as possible is key to aborting the hit. With a bag large enough to assure no suddden stopage in O2 flow, the panic is reduced and I abort more hits than ever in my 21 years of CH.

Yes it does make a huge difference.

Don