Power outage--grr!

[chunkyfrog]

I sent the following email to the editor of my local newspaper--
(Background--we had a severe thunderstorm yesterday evening--with high winds and fallen trees
and a massive power outage starting at about 8 last night.)
We will see if anything comes of it--(my letter):

Most of my neighbors had their electricity restored within 3 hours or so--excellent job!
But our block did not receive power until 10:30 this morning.
This was very stressful for me, as I had to sleep without my CPAP--I feel lousy today--but I'm alive!
I spoke to a lady this morning, who had to go without her oxygen concentrator until 11 last night.
I am wondering why there is no database of people who use ventilators, concentrators and other medical equipment in their homes. LES has no way of knowing where a service delay may threaten a persons life.

[quietmorning]

I think I'm going to take your lead and send a similar letter to the electric company and perhaps the first responders in our area. . . and maybe to city hall.

Maybe someone will get on the ball.

I talked to my insurance company to try to get them to pay for my battery back up for this reason - as it is truly a medical necessity, but they wouldn't go for it - since the battery can be used for camping and such.

[jmcanzo]

Good thing you don't live in South East Michigan.. When a storm comes thru here and we loose power it is usually counted in DAYS not hours until being restored.

[chunkyfrog]

Fortunately, the system here has been gradually moving over to all underground--all new--and replacement--lines.
They have a lot of experience here; and that probably contributes to the speed.
A few years ago, we had a massive ice storm, and outages were up to a week (in town--rural is another story)

[DoriC]

I called my electric co last year and they said we would be put on a "preferential" list and sure enough when we had a total blackout in our community awhile ago our power was restored in 2hrs while the rest of the neighborhood waited 5hrs. BTW, they do not consider cpap a life support system but only a medical device to assist with better breathing,(something like that)?

[cowlypso]

That's weird that your power company doesn't already do that. The 4-5 companies across 3 states that I've had accounts with all had that sort of database (although I'm not sure what the criteria are to get listed, and what equipment qualifies). They also had special rates for people running life support equipment.

I'm not sure whether any electric company would consider CPAP as a reason to have priority restoration of service. For one, there's a lot of people using CPAP, nebulizers, refrigerated medications, etc. And they are all spread out throughout the service area. So if they had a complete database of all houses where electricity was necessary for medical reasons, there would likely be a person on every block that qualified. Second, CPAP does not draw much electricity, and can easily be powered by battery or generator for a few days. Finally, CPAP is not considered a life-saving device in the same way that a ventilator is. If a ventilator-dependent patient runs out of power for a night, they die 100% of the time. If a CPAP patient runs out of power for a night, 99% of the time they are just crabby and tired.

So yes, it would be great if the electric company could get every CPAP user restored before bedtime, but it's unrealistic to expect that. As a CPAP user, it is your responsibility to weight the pros and cons of having a backup in place. Of course, everbody would love to have a backup, but they are costly. If you live in an area where you lose power often and get restored slowly (like many rural areas), then a backup is probably worth the money. If you live in an area that is often restored quickly (within a day) and loses power rarely, then maybe you just deal with the 1 night a year or so that you're without.

You should always have some sort of backup plan in place in case of a serious power issue. Whether it's battery, generator, hotel, or friend who live in the next town over. The Sunday before Memorial Day this summer, I was staying with a friend, a huge storm took out power all over the place. I left on Monday to go back to work (and back to power!), but they didn't get power back until Thursday night. The entire town was out, and they didn't get to anybody in the town until Wednesday, some people didn't get power back until Friday.

[msradar65]

Ours does not do that...then again we rarely loose power. The key thing here since I live in Hurricane alley...is to be prepared. If you KNOW you must have electricity for medical reasons then you need to be prepared with battery back up or generator power. I have both.

Having spent a month with no electricity or drinkable tap water after the last hurricane we are very prepared here. I would suggest doing the same.

[Tip10]

Having spent a great deal of my professional life involved in the electric industry I can tell you that outage restoration is done on a "biggest bang for the buck" kind of scheduling. During outages most utilities work diligently to restore power to all of their customers but usually schedule the work in a way that will result in restoring the most customers the quickest.

It may have been a case where sectionalizing allowed them to simply re-energize the circuits feeding your neighbors where the circuit feeding you required damage repair before it could be re-energized.

Most utilities have databases indicating which customers are on life sustaining equipment and will provide priority to restoring those circuits.

Have you ever contacted your utility to inquire about being included on such a list? If not how would you expect them to know? HIPA laws certainly prevent your doctor from telling them even if they would consider it.

[chunkyfrog]

HIPAA had crossed my mind; but a secure database with addresses only and access only to emergency responders and repair supervisors might solve the dilemma of letting people perish for the sake of their privacy.
Inclusion in the database would have to be voluntary, to allow for those who prefer extreme privacy over safety.

[nanwilson]

Just get yourself a battery set-up and you won't be without power. If the power goes out here, I just get up and plug my machine into my back up system and go back to bed. I keep my gear in a corner of my bedroom and recharge the battery about once a month to keep it up in case of a big outage.

[Tip10]

HIPAA had crossed my mind; but a secure database with addresses only and access only to emergency responders and repair supervisors might solve the dilemma of letting people perish for the sake of their privacy.
Inclusion in the database would have to be voluntary, to allow for those who prefer extreme privacy over safety.

Not sure I got across what I was trying to say. Those kinds of databases do exist at most utilities. The question I was trying to ask was have you contacted your particular utility to see what they include in their database and what the procedure is to get added to that database.
It varies by utility but for the most part the customer must be the one to initiate the process. Most utilities I've dealt with have some form of verification form you take and have completed by your doc and submit to them for inclusion in the database. Some utilities include OSA and its machines for inclusion others do not. However, I'll venture to say that in all cases the utility will advise you to have back-up plans in place to cover power outages -- things like battery back-ups, secondary sites you can go to, etc.

The supply of power to our homes is a very complicated and intertwined thing -- subject to the vagaries of mother nature, human nature and the occasional drunk driver.

Remember way back in August of 2003 -- the basics of it were a tree and a wee bit of human error and a blackout of some 55 million customers in Ontario and 8 US states for an extended period of time. The utilities feeding the vast majority of those customers had absolutely nothing to do with the blackout -- they were victims of the interconnected power system.

[chunkyfrog]

I had contacted their office previously; with the result that there was no way, no how. They just 'don't do that'.
My neighbor had to go without her oxygen concentrator!
Hence my note to the newspaper.
My concern was not for myself--we can afford back-up if we need it;
but too many others are in worse situations--and simply cannot afford this 'luxury';
and there appears to be no protocol for them.
-At least not in our forward-thinking community.

[archangle]

I'm not sure such a policy is a good idea anyway.

Joe Patient calls the utility company and gets put on such a list. Along with 800 other people in town.

Instead of taking measures to have his own emergency backup power system, Joe decides he can't spend the money and counts on getting priority power restoration from the electric company.

A storm with tornadoes blows through. Joes power goes down. In order to fix Joe's power, the electric company has to fix a major power line to get power to the south half of town. Then they need to ship a large transformer from a few hundred miles away to replace the one that blew out in the substation. Then they need to replace a distribution line from the substation to Joe's neighborhood. Before they can energize that distribution line, they have to find and cut or repair all of the 40 downed power lines on that circuit that would be death traps if they turn the power back on. When they get all of that done, they finally have power to the line in front of Joe's house and can repair the line from the pole to Joe's house.

There are 200 other people scattered around town in the same situation as Joe. There are also hospitals with limited run time on their emergency generation equipment. There are nursing homes and similar facilities with limited or no emergency backup power. There are evacuation shelter locations, important utilities like water, gas, and sewage that need to run.

Even thought the electric utility does treat Joe with "priority," there are 199 other customers ahead of Joe in terms of priority. Even if they do everything "right", Joe may be waiting several days. Or even a week.

If you can't make it without power for CPAP or whatever, you need to have backup power somehow, and be prepared to evacuate somewhere when your emergency power supply runs out.

By the way, if you're ever in an evacuation, there will probably be a question about whether you have "special medical needs" or some such. You may very well be asked this question when you are directed to a shelter, or to get on a bus. If you can't get by without power for your CPAP, the answer is "yes," unless you're told otherwise. Do NOT count on being able to plug in your CPAP at a regular shelter.

Even if the there is a minor power emergency, there are sometimes emergency shelters set up. You may need to go to such a shelter, simply because you need CPAP. Or camp out on a friend's couch.