Ignorance is not bliss . . .

j.a.taylor · Post by **j.a.taylor** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 9:48 pm

My wife traveled this week to Pennsylvania with two sisters who are friends of our family. One of them is having a 6 hour back surgery next Monday (in the hopes that this will prevent her back problems from causing permanent paralysis), and since both sisters have physical ailments, my wife went along to help with the driving.

Both of them use xPAP machines. The sister having surgery has an older ResMed (S6) I believe, and her insurance won't purchase another one for her, but it's really on its last leg.

Her sister, who is a retired nurse, has the same machine as me, a nice, new, shiny ResMed S8 AutoSet Vantage.

Well as they were sleeping tonight, the S6 started giving out. Our friend was struggling to breath, gasping and wheezing, so her sister offered her the use of her new AutoSet Vantage. She needs to get her rest before her surgery.

The problem: nobody knew if the machine was set on auto or straight CPAP, or if it matched the settings on the other machine. As they were trying to get it to work, it wasn't responding well to the ResMed full-face mask our friend uses. The sister who was a nurse commented that it would be helpful if they could get into the Clinical Menu.

The light clicks on, and my wife comments, "John knows how to get into the Clinical Menu. He can walk us through the adjustments we need to make."

They call me, I walk them through the menu, they are on AutoSet, help them set up for the mask, and our friend is ready to sleep breathing easier.

It felt good to help. I couldn't have accomplished this without the great lessons learned from this forum. Thanks fellow xPAPers for agreeing with me that ignorance is not bliss . . .

A dear friend is sleeping better tonight.

SleepingBeauty · Post by **SleepingBeauty** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 10:18 pm

That's awesome that you were able to help them get to the right settings!

Will the insurance provide the sister who needed surgery with a new machine now that hers officially died?

DannyB · Post by **DannyB** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 11:18 pm

So did you see johnny goodman's thread about the traditional DMEs bashing online suppliers? One post called consumers who buy online "idiots".... go figure!

Slinky · Post by **Slinky** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 7:49 am

He wasn't calling the patients idiots. He was referring to the CMS people.

Wulfman... · Post by **Wulfman...** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 11:03 am

Way to go, John!

Hope everybody's surgery goes well.

Best wishes,

Den