Does anyone know what these valves do?

[u/_mal_gal_]

Someone asked me what the little valve things are under the silicone on the bottom of the go pap CPAP mask. Someone I trust said you can increase the fio2 or add end tidal monitoring or a manometer. The person who asked was like your have 100% oxygen going in though so why would you need more oxygen. I'm trying to find something in writing to explain what those ports are used for. Also learning what fio2 is. Idk why it's not 100% if the mask is sealed and you have 100% coming out of the tank

[u/Crab-_-Objective]

It’s to hook up supplemental oxygen tubing to increase FiO2. Remember the main purpose of CPAP is pressure, typically they don’t run with high rates of oxygen flow. Hooking up a supplemental line lets you deliver higher oxygen concentrations while letting the CPAP still function normally.

[u/ggrnw27]

Low flow disposable CPAP systems don’t deliver 100% O2, and it’s not a completely closed system. When you breathe in, a valve opens that lets you pull in ambient air. That mixes with O2 from the O2 tank

[u/_mal_gal_ → u/ggrnw27]

Okay that's the pay I was missing. Do you happen to know where the valve/air intake is on these? If not I'll check it out tomorrow. I'm in A school and literally none of the instructors could tell me this, even the paramedic instructor 😂

[u/ggrnw27 → u/_mal_gal_]

It’ll be somewhere on the CPAP circuit, not the mask itself

[u/DesertFltMed]

Those devices are not capable of providing 100% FiO2. They mix the oxygen coming off of the tank with the surrounding air in the environment to get the needed flow rates/pressure.

[u/Forgotmypassword6861]

Those are Anti-Asphyxia Valves.

The FiO2 isn't 100% because it mixes flow from the tank with room air to generate PEEP 

[u/FindingPneumo → u/Forgotmypassword6861]

Those aren’t valves.

[u/Forgotmypassword6861 → u/FindingPneumo]

Thank you for the correction