I wrote a post yesterday. I apparently didn’t press publish. I think I actually did press post but somehow it didn’t get posted. It doesn’t matter. I know I wrote a post yesterday, as I am writing a post today. It just turns out that yesterdays post will have today’s date on it. But that’s beside the point. On to today’s topic.
As a follow up to yesterday’s post about my sleep study, I think the protocol for sleep studies needs some serious revision. They spent two hours at the beginning of my study last night “establishing a baseline”. That’s doctor speak for having me try to sleep without my mask.
At this point they know I have serious apnea. When I was originally tested I stopped breathing sixty times in an hour. That’s a rate of once a minute. For those that don’t have apnea it is difficult to explain the sensation of waking up gasping for air. Surely it doesn’t take two hours for them to establish that I am still in desperate need of the device.
Why did I have to submit to this barbaric study. (Please note: the protocol was barbaric. The sleep technician was a great guy who was just doing his job.) That’s easy, the insurance company wanted to be sure that I still needed this device. In other words we are once again allowing a corporation to practice medicine without a license. This is one of my pet peeves.
The rest of the night went fairly well. At first the pressure was lower than ideal but that was still preferable to no air pressure at all without the mask. Then, there was a little bit of discomfort at the end of the calibration procedure when they had increased the pressure past the optimal stage and air was leaking out the side of the mask and coming out of my mouth and waking me up. I did sleep fairly well throughout the calibration though.
I do get a new, improved CPAP machine for my troubles. I just can’t imagine why they can’t figure out that I need the damn thing without torturing me like that. I’m going to talk to the doctor about it when we have the follow up appointment.
Enough of my first world problems. I wish you all sweet dreams. Remember to tell the people you love that you love them and most important of all, be kind.