Any New Thoughts On Concentrators?

I just spent a couple of hours searching the forum for advice on oxygen concentrators and did not find much. My doctor has prescribed oxygen for me, but I only have a day or two to find one and buy it if I want insurance to help me pay for it, which I do.

Does anyone have the Everflo Q or the Invacare Perfecto 2? What do you think about those machines?

Any other recommendations are most welcome. I just don't know where to start and must do this very quickly.

bump

I didn't even know insurances bought 02 concentrators. I thought they all just rented them forever and ever and ever and ....

I'm traveling this week: one night in Lexington, KY; one night in Pigeon Forge, TN, 3 nights in Beaufort, SC, one night in Knoxville, TN and home. No way I can haul even a 3 liter concentrator and enough tanks w/5 of us in the vehicle and no way to have equipment provided each night in a different location. So - turns out there is a "portable" concentrator called a Sequal. It can run continuous for my VPAP Auto, and pulse or continuous on the car's cigarette lighter and on pulse as a portable to get around during the day. It sounds great, I didn't even know such a gadget exists. They are PRICEY tho!!! Even just renting it for the week, no insurance coverage for it, $500 deposit returned when I return the Sequal and a $50 weekly rental charge. I think someone said they run about $7000-$8000 to purchase new. Yep, that's 3 zeroes, not 2.

Frankly, I would very much like to be able to obtain info on the newer 5L concentrators too. I'd like quiet, cool and energy efficient. Some of these older units can cost as much as $30 to $60 a month to run. Our electric company only gives a $4.60 "life saving device" discount.

LoQ wrote:I just spent a couple of hours searching the forum for advice on oxygen concentrators and did not find much. My doctor has prescribed oxygen for me, but I only have a day or two to find one and buy it if I want insurance to help me pay for it, which I do.

Does anyone have the Everflo Q or the Invacare Perfecto 2? What do you think about those machines?

Any other recommendations are most welcome. I just don't know where to start and must do this very quickly.

I have the Invacare Perfecto 2. It's the one that my DME provided when oxygen was ordered. For me, it's like Slinky said -- perpetual rental. :::sigh:::

It seems to work fine, but it's not the quietest thing around! From what I've read here (and a few other places) these oxygen concentrators are not known for being quiet. The "pump" on it makes a fair amount of noise, but my husband and I have gotten used to it.

Good luck in your search!

Looks like we will be getting the Everflo Q this week as the DME that can get the Invacare Perfecto 2 for us does not take our insurance. I know one person with the Everflow Q and she says that it throws a ton of heat but works well. Our insurance will only rent. Please let us know what you end up with and how it works for you.

L. Mother of three angels, one of whom forgets to breathe.

Forgot to log in, the post above was mine!

L. Mother of three angels, one of whom forgets to breathe.

I have the one that is pictured below. It has a cost of about $800.00 dollars if you buy it but if the insurance buys it for you it will cost 5000.00 and up. I don't think johnny sells them but they can be bought online with an RX. The one I was using was loud and gave off lots of heat.
I told my insurance company that they were stupid for paying 5000.00 but they didn't care. Anyway after 6 months or so it became mine.
http://everflo.respironics.com/

Concentrators tend to be rentals primarily due to the upkeep and maintenance required on them.

They all tend to be noisy to varying degrees though not all that bad really. The noise and heat come from the fact that they have small-ish 2 cylinder compressors to bumping up room air to a pressurized output.

They pump air through seive beds to filter out the nitrogen to put out ~91% oxygen or so. The compressors, switches and seive beds all end up needing maintenance to varying degrees none of which are easy or cheap. This is not to say that every concentrator will break down every year and need hundreds of dollars in servicing but it's also not at all unheard of.

They are devices that the marketplace continues to demand smaller, lighter and cheaper units. The problem is when you have a smaller, lighter cheaper unit that's under pressure and running 24x7, well...something is going to give sooner or later.

At my previous DME company we were required to service each and every concentrator out in the field every 6 months and do a rebuild every 12. If a rebuild had to be done on a patient-owned device who was not on our service it would take most of an afternoon and usually run over $500 dollars by the time you add up parts, labor and pickup/delivery costs.

That's the primary reason why you see most insurance companies doing a rental on Concentrators. Though the move to capped rental and converting them to a purchase may change some of that. It's still going to cost a fortune to have them rebuilt though if a patient owns it.

mattman

Yeah, well, my first 5L concentrator was NOT new when it was provided in 2006 by any stretch of the imagination. When it died they provided me w/another used 5L concentrator that also was NOT new this year. And w/the new Medicare provisions they would have been able to start billing all over again had the original waited one more year to die.

What I would really like is a newer, more energy efficient, quieter, cooler 5L concentrator. *sigh* I will say, my DME was at my door w/this second concentrator w/in an hour of my calling to tell them my original had died. This despite they have provided me w/4 "E" tanks to get me thru at least 8 hours in an emergency on continuous flow and even longer on pulse.

Thank you all for your thoughts and help. I bought the Everflo Q. Yes, it would be nice to have something portable, but those are mostly limited to 3 LPM, and as noted they are very expensive. My choices were to go through the local DME, where I am sure insurance will pay for part of it, or buy it online myself and hope that insurance will help.

If I go through the DME, it's rent to own. The point at which the rent stops and the ownership starts is when the payments by me and the insurance company, mostly by me, have reached something between $3000 and $4000 for a Millennium 5 L; I think that might be an older machine, not sure.

I bought the Everflo Q online, which cost me less than $600--I'd be paying that much in just a few months of rental. There is still a chance that my insurance company will reimburse me for more than half of that, but even if they don't, I'm still ahead financially. And even if it needs to be repaired, I can still buy another new one and be ahead financially.

The Everflo Q weighs 31 pounds, and while not exactly portable, it is still a reasonable thing to think I could put it in the car with the rest of my gear if I wanted to go somewhere. It's at least as portable as a toddler, and less trouble.


Everyone will have to come to their own conclusion about whether it benefits them to rent forever or not. I have a private insurance policy, not medicare. For me it is a no brainer to buy online, even without insurance. The fact that I have met my deductible this year (and nearly all of my copay as well) simply makes it a possibility that insurance will kick in a portion. If they don't, I'm still ahead of the game without their help.


I bought from Oximedical and so far have had an OUTSTANDING experience with them. They are in the same league as cpap.com. I would recommend without reservation either of these companies, and in fact, encourage you to do business with them. Oximedical's website is not as robust in terms of information as you might like it to be, but in terms of interaction with the people there, they are an incredible company. It's so nice to be able to give such a positive report about a business.