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As RG led off, find out what this test really is.

I put my money on an overnight pulse ox.

So now we see the Jules mattress.
Just leave you money to your cats - leave your cats to me, I'm Gumby Damit.

jules wrote:As RG led off, find out what this test really is.
I put my mattress on an overnight pulse ox.

My first study was at home!

I was hooked to about8 to 10 wires and he plugged them into some little recording gadget, all the wires we're on me and a big T shaped drag around thingie that held all those nasty wires...
Everytime I had to use the restroom, I had to drag that big old thing around and it wouldn't fit through the door unless I turned it sideways, it was awful and yucky/gross!

The next morning the (DME- owner) that brought it over and hooked me up came and picked it up so he could take it in and download my results.

He called me and said I was posotive for sleep apnea and to come down and pick up a machine to take home and use so I could do a home titration, so I did...

Would you like to know what that sucker charged my Insurance Company for those 2 home tests?????????? $2,100.00 each = $4,200.00, yes, I said a total of $4,200.00 plus all the equipment, masks, accessories, 3 masks (and I only got 1) etc...

Now, the thing is, when I called to schedule an Overnight study and titration at the sleep center, the receptionist told me the cost would be $750.00 per test= a total of $1,500.00 so i'd like to know where and how your dme came up with a $100.00 titration????????? That's Unheard of, he will end up charging you Ins. way more than that so watch out for those guys.

I have 2 cpap machines, one is the legacy classic Remstar Auto with c/flex and I used it to TITRATE my husband with and found that he had sleep apnea, so we just cancelled the sleep study, he won't use the machine anyway, yes I know restedgal, I showed him your response to my post regarding this matter and he still wouldn't wear the mask , as far as the life Ins, can't afford it right now...

I would just use my cpap on AUTO for 1 week, download my data and see what the 90% pressure was and go from there..

Whatever decision you make, it's yours and I hope you make the right one, however if I could get a sleepstudy done for really just $100.00, I would go for it but I would hand him a $100.00 check on the spot and make him give me a reciept for it saying "PAID IN FULL" for a HOME STUDY.

Keep us informed

SleepyNoMore

Sounds cheap... IIRC my first PSG study was $2660 and the second (titration) study was $2970 (The insurance company had to pay $309 for the $50 mask, you know)

I checked back with my DME and the Machine they use is the "Watch-PAT100". He says it is 95% correct and there is usually user or clinician error involved in that other 5%. Here is a link for the unit.

http://www.itamar-medical.com/Product.asp?pid=3006

I confirmed that price at $100. This includes the use of the unit, the two finger sensors and reading of the data. He said they usually charge $150, but for me... (actually I do like him and think he is giving me a deas on this).

In looking at my encore pro data from the last four night I am a bit more hesitant to proceed.

10.7 IPAP 90%
5.8 EPAP 90%

4.2 AHI
1.8 Obstructive Apnea
2.4 Hypopneas.

2.3 Plow Limitation Index
2.0 Vibratory Snore Index

Perhaps the part that scares me the most about setting my machine at 6cm and going the night to see what happens (or doing the home sleep study) is that during those four days only 16.5 of my time was as low as 6. That means that my body called for higher pressures 83.5% of the time.

I wonder if I should just quite pursuing this all together and find a campsite rather than go backpacking. If I can't get an electrical hookup, how well would my Respironics car plug-in work for a whole night or more?

Does anyone have any more insights on how to rpoceed?

Scott

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CPAPopedia Keywords Contained In This Post (Click For Definition): respironics, Encore Pro, DME, AHI