I'm curious about what sort of experiences people here have had with sleep dx and tx at Kaiser Permanente.
A close friend has had FIVE overnight sleep evals in the past year with Kaiser Permanente.
The sleep doctor told her after the first night that she has one of the worst cases of OSA he'd ever seen. So they brought her back for titration and the next morning told her they couldn't find a pressure that would work for her. And that was repeated three more nights, about a month apart. She said they tried her on various sorts of machines and interfaces. After the fifth overnight, they simply stopped contacting her! She has not been provided with an XPAP, not been referred for surgery, not been sent any letters or called in for more sleep medicine appointments.
(My friend is not a healthy woman by any means: She has serious chronic pain and auto-immune issues as well as hypertension and a few other conditions.)
Is this typical of Kaiser? It seems kind of irresponsible to me.
What usually happens to be people who cannot be titrated at any pressure level? Aren't they usually referred to surgery?
I've been nagging her a bit to push for answers. But it seems like she's sort of dreading going on CPAP or having surgery, hasn't much awareness of her OSA (although she has nightmares about being strangled, etc.) and is sort of assuming/pretending that their lack of contact means that it is somehow OK for her to live like this indefinitely!
Grace
Kaiser Permanente
2 posts
• Page 1 of 1
Kaiser Permanente
Started CPAP on 7/1/2005
Mild apnea
Plus upper airway resistance syndrome with severe alpha intrusion
Mild apnea
Plus upper airway resistance syndrome with severe alpha intrusion
-
ca_hosehead
- Posts: 150
- Joined: Sat Dec 09, 2006 3:51 pm
I went through a sleep study recently at Kaiser. Although my situation wasn't nearly as difficult as your friend's I can make some observations about my experience.
Kaiser will not keep the ball rolling, that's up to the patient. It's a big organization and there isn't any group that is in charge of pestering you. I don't think this is any fault of Kaiser's. If you think about it, most medical practices operate this way. If you don't make an appointment for a needed checkup, then they may or may not be bothering you about it. Most Doctors seem to assume that if you are still having problems then they will be hearing from you and if they don't hear from you then you got well. For most problems it works OK. You get an infection, you get an antibiotic, you get better, the Doctor does not hear from you again.
But if you DO show up and complain then Kaiser is pretty good about getting you some treatment. When I went to my primary care Doctor and talked about my symptoms his reaction was, "Well, let's get you a sleep study." I haven't found them to be dismissive or trying to blow me off. But you DO have to be somewhat proactive about your treatment.
I suspect what happened was your friend blew off an appointment or two -- or failed to make one and the ball got dropped. If she goes back in and whines they'll do something with her. If not then nothing will happen.
Kaiser will not keep the ball rolling, that's up to the patient. It's a big organization and there isn't any group that is in charge of pestering you. I don't think this is any fault of Kaiser's. If you think about it, most medical practices operate this way. If you don't make an appointment for a needed checkup, then they may or may not be bothering you about it. Most Doctors seem to assume that if you are still having problems then they will be hearing from you and if they don't hear from you then you got well. For most problems it works OK. You get an infection, you get an antibiotic, you get better, the Doctor does not hear from you again.
But if you DO show up and complain then Kaiser is pretty good about getting you some treatment. When I went to my primary care Doctor and talked about my symptoms his reaction was, "Well, let's get you a sleep study." I haven't found them to be dismissive or trying to blow me off. But you DO have to be somewhat proactive about your treatment.
I suspect what happened was your friend blew off an appointment or two -- or failed to make one and the ball got dropped. If she goes back in and whines they'll do something with her. If not then nothing will happen.
2 posts
• Page 1 of 1