Fraudulent Sleep Study

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PalmHarborKeith

Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by PalmHarborKeith » Sat Feb 11, 2017 5:58 pm

Hi a few mouths ago I went to my MD for insomnia. She told me that for her to treat my insomnia I would have to go in for a sleep study. Now I have been told be a number of Doctors that sleep studies are just high tech sales pitches for cap's. As I could not sleep and would go for days without sleep I was desperate. I went in for the study and did not sleep the entire night. T make sure that no one thought I was sleeping I routinely would check the time on my watch, I did the drums roll on my chest to a popular 60s tune, and I would routinely hum a few different tunes and I did so clearly and loudly so that it could not be mistaken for anything else. When I went back to my MD I just new that she would tell me I did not seep during the study and that the diagnosis was insomnia. I almost fell off the exam table when she said the the Doctor that read the sleep study said that I had numerous "involuntary" hand and eye motions, and that I snored. He said the I had Sleep Apnea and needed to us a cpap. I protested and was told that that doctors reading was the last of the story. I then went to the Hospital and demanded a copy of the entire sleep study something I had to demand and inform the legal department that I had a right to my medical records. When I got the sleep study I saw that it had a split screen. On the right side of the screen there was some lines that would move every time I did and ever time that happened some printing that would say what the computer thought was going on. on the left side was a film of me in bed. Every-time I would lift my hand to look at my watch the lines would go crazy and it would say that was an " involuntary " hand and eye movement! The drumming on my chest was " involuntary " hand motions, and my humming was You guest it " snoring "! I have tried to show this to my MD to no avail. I was told that I need to use a cpap or my heath insurance would not cover a host of medical things. now I have tried the cpap torchere device! I can't sleep with it on even with the sleeping pills that my Doctor finale gave me. I am about to kill myself if I can't get rid of this evil thing.

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palerider
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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by palerider » Sat Feb 11, 2017 6:13 pm

is that the waaaaaambulance I hear roaring this way?

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Julie
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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by Julie » Sat Feb 11, 2017 6:15 pm

Plse see next note... this won't delete for some reason.
Last edited by Julie on Sat Feb 11, 2017 6:16 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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Julie
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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by Julie » Sat Feb 11, 2017 6:16 pm

Hi, I think you need a different doctor - one who knows the difference between insomnia and apnea (tho' lots of people with apnea do have insomnia). You need the report of your study rather than the raw data, so you can show it to someone (like us actually) who can make sense of it for you, though if you really, really did not sleep at all I don't know how useful that report would be.

It's important that you know if you have symptoms of sleep apnea or just have e.g. insomnia and possibly some other sleep related disorder (there are lots of them) that Cpap does not treat. If you can get the report of the study and put it in this thread (so we can follow things along) do it and someone will see what's what and make suggestions. So far it sounds like you're being jerked around rather than helped. See if you can get a referral to a neurologist or pulmonologist who specializes in sleep problems.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by Goofproof » Sat Feb 11, 2017 6:47 pm

His isn't the main problem, try Attitude. Jim
Use data to optimize your xPAP treatment!

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kteague
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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by kteague » Sat Feb 11, 2017 9:26 pm

Not sure if your sleep doctor or clinic would agree, but mine set up a time to review the areas in question. They pulled up the video on the screen as well as the corresponding data to see if the data indicated whether I was awake or asleep at the times in question. Awake and asleep are determined by data, not perception. In my own studies, somehow the lines were blurred due to side effects of meds and long term severe sleep deprivation. When I was deemed asleep, I had awareness of my surroundings. I've read that awareness can occur in Stage 1 sleep. When I was deemed awake, I thought I had dozed off. But the doc sat with me and walked through the points in question to my satisfaction - not my understanding, but my satisfaction considering my limited expertise. Is it your sleep doc or regular doc that doesn't want to hear your concerns about the test?

It seems your efforts to prevent a misconception of your sleep have not worked in your favor. In retrospect it would likely have been more beneficial to try to sleep and let the sensors pick up what happens during your sleep. If you ever have another study, I'd suggest that. It can't be conducive to sleep to be thinking about actions to take. I suggest you write up a very conscise synopsis of your concerns with mostly bullet points, not paragraphs, and send it to whatever sleep doctor signed off on your test, and ask them to review the data at the points of concern. If they will do that you can make your decisions from that point. If your sleep study did diagnose sleep apnea, you will still need to address that. Since you don't see the rest of the report as credible, I understand your reluctance to accept the validity of an OSA diagnsosis. I too am interested in the report from your study.

While using CPAP may require an adjustment period and without help fine tuning everything it can be a miserable experience. But it should not have to cause you to want to die over it. Hopefully you can be more specific about that struggle and get some pointers on improving your CPAP experience. Some of us, even with horrible early experiences, have grown to all but love and worship our life saving machines. A little time, a little support from users here, and a "can do" attitude could lead you to a better place.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by chunkyfrog » Sun Feb 12, 2017 9:41 pm

I suspect my first "sleep study" was fraudulent.
They used an IV drug to render me unconscious and ran an EEG and an EKG.
There was no normal sleep, and I was given a "clean bill of health".
This meant the HMO had no responsibility to treat me.
Really, I would only suspect a NEGATIVE test to be a fake--as was mine.
I suffered from untreated OSA for the next 19 years. Lovely.
Since then, I have never willingly been under the marginal to non-existent "care" of an HMO.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by bdz » Mon Feb 13, 2017 11:19 am

I too had a fraudulent study this past April. I went in, familiar with place and tech. As soon as I settled down, I developed one of the most severe right sided headaches I have ever had. I had to be flat..no raised head of the bed. That is what intensified the headache. At home I would have put more pillows under my head...gotten my ice pack out. Not allowed, I had to be flat.

These headaches were some of the reason I had the study done. It may sound weird, but I heard myself whimpering all night. I did not really sleep...and the study showed this. I also, as I have done often before CPAP, glued my tongue to the roof of my mouth to prevent my tongue from falling back. No moisture between my tongue and upper palate when I woke.

I wrote a strong note, as required after a study there, regarding how I felt during the night. The doctor totally ignored my explanation about having the intense headache and accompanying pain. He did note that I did not reach a deep level of sleep, that I did not have but a few events...determined that I did not have sleep apnea...but abnormal sleep patterns.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by FishLips » Mon Feb 13, 2017 12:32 pm

I felt that my first sleep study was complete bullsh*t. I KNOW that I did NOT sleep the entire night. The tech said I was asleep within 5 minutes and entered multiple phases of sleep over the course of 4 hours. I wrote that it was the worst night of sleep I'd had in years. The tech wrote that it was typical of my normal sleep. I wish I'd seen the video. That said, I was sure of sleep apnea before I went in. We'd seen it at home, and that was part of the reason I went in.

I was never actually able to see my sleep doc after the study. A month out, my first follow-up appointment was rescheduled to meet with his nurse practitioner instead, 7 months after the study. I was also working with a sleep therapist (for insomnia). I told her that I thought the study was BS, and she said it could be something like "conscious sleep" or "subconscious awareness" (I forget the specific term). It wasn't her study though - what could she say?

The nurse practitioner wasn't much help in that regard either. Seven months after the fact, she basically shrugged her shoulders when I told her my frustrations. I decided at my 1-year FU that I was done with that part of the therapy and would handle it on my own. Of course, then she prescribed an MAD and gave me a printed list of providers. With no intention of actually going that route, I called about prices on a few - which were ridiculous. My dentist was half the cost, and even suggested that I try a DIY version, which was a 1/10th of his price.

I've seen benefits to XPAP therapy; but feel that the results were mostly predetermined, and that they just filled in the gaps to get to that result. It was also interesting when my wife's prescription was EXACTLY the same as mine, and was also the default settings of the machine I bought outside of insurance. I think the process is 90% cookie cutter nonsense.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by ChicagoGranny » Mon Feb 13, 2017 12:59 pm

PalmHarborKeith wrote:T make sure that no one thought I was sleeping I routinely would check the time on my watch, I did the drums roll on my chest to a popular 60s tune, and I would routinely hum a few different tunes and I did so clearly and loudly so that it could not be mistaken for anything else.
During a lab sleep study, you are wired to an EEG. The results of the EEG show whether you were sleeping or not. You can't fool the EEG, but you can fool yourself.

PalmHarborKeith wrote:Now I have been told be a number of Doctors that sleep studies are just high tech sales pitches for cap's.
You seem to know how to pick idiot doctors.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by chunkyfrog » Mon Feb 13, 2017 6:20 pm

I had one doctor who was senile, another who could not give a shit--I fired both.
The only real quack I have met was a chiropracter my husband visited---ONCE (yes, he smelled duck right away, too)

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by D.H. » Mon Feb 13, 2017 6:47 pm

You need to make an effort to sleep during a sleep test. While there may be a handful of exceptions, Sleep Apnea is usually under-diagnosed, not over-diagnosed.

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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by palerider » Mon Feb 13, 2017 7:09 pm

FishLips wrote:I felt that my first sleep study was complete bullsh*t. I KNOW that I did NOT sleep the entire night. The tech said I was asleep within 5 minutes and entered multiple phases of sleep over the course of 4 hours.
as Granny says, the human brain is remarkably good at fooling itself about sleep.

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chunkyfrog
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Re: Fraudulent Sleep Study

Post by chunkyfrog » Mon Feb 13, 2017 7:42 pm

I noticed after using a sleep tracker that I had slept much more than I had thought--and deeper.

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