Do you have a high BMI? Better get a CPAP!!

[ImDavid]

so heres the story now in my saga. I am a big fat truck driver. I use a CPAP machine due to my sleep apnea. My machine is over 8 years old and wont give a printout of use. I take my recertification physical and the doctor says new government regulations require the use of a CPAP machine for any truck driver with a high BMI. She disqualified me until I get her a printout. So off I go to buy a new CPAP machine, wait a week, no pay of course, I went back to Concentra with my printout of usage on my new cpap machine. The doctor has me take another physical, just did it last week, and after it tells me my DMV report is only good for one week. Then come back with another printout, take another physical and get renewed for one month. Come back again in a month, bring printout, take physical, then come back every year. When I went back to the DMV I questioned them and they told me its not their policy, that once you clear the physical you come back every two years. Its the doctor who is forcing me to be off work for now will be one month, and then take five physicals in one year. So word of wisdom to any big driver like me is make sure you get a CPAP machine that has a printout or be screwed like I am. Or just lose the weight. But if you are phisically fit and still need a CPAP be prepared...


anyone else get screwed like this?

 

[Duck]

Sue the doctor?

 

[rebel]

Good doctors are hard to find........but don't stop looking.

If this is your doctor, time to find another. If it's the company doctor, there may be another agenda in play here.

 

[Injun]

Your doctor is full of shit. Being fat does not automatically put someone on CPAP. Further evaluation is required, sleep study if indicated and then, if apnea exists, CPAP.

Since you already have a documented history of CPAP use for the purpose of correcting OSA, you will have to prove you're using your machine. Don't ya just love guv'mint surveillance and meddling?

 

[Tim]

I take my recertification physical and the doctor says new government regulations require the use of a CPAP machine for any truck driver with a high BMI.

Once she said that you should have stopped her and made her point out the regulation in whole.

anyone else get screwed like this?

No I dont go to doctors that wanna feed off my teat.

 

[Tazz]

It's in the new guidance for ME's @Tim.

http://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/rules-regulations/topics/medical/faqs.aspx#question26

 

[Tim]

It's in the new guidance for ME's @Tim.

http://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/rules-regulations/topics/medical/faqs.aspx#question26

Guidance is one thing.....telling a driver its now a new Government regulation you have to be tested is another.
Even without checking I know I have a high BMI and not once has any doctor hinted that I do a sleep study. I sleep vary well any time I choose to go to bed. The only to I snore is in the spring when tree and grass pollen sky rocket.

I can take a 1 2 or 3 hour nap and be ready to truck..........Ask @Duck

 

[Tazz]

Oh I am not agreeing with it. I took the precaution of having their stupid test done in advance because through my Doc i could do it at home for $50. Just letting you know they are teaching the ME's to look for it. They are even specifically addressing it in the new training standards. Sleep disorders have always had the potential to be disqualifying they are just pushing apnea now.

 

[Tim]

And there lies the rub in all of this..........you did it on your own with your family Doc for $50, a trucker goes in for a physical and is denied until he or she forks over thousands for a test. Its a money racket.

 

[Tazz]

Agreed. That's why I did what I did. Two years ago getting my physical at Concentra the little bobble head kept asking about my snoring. I told her I do not snore. She pulled out a tape and I asked her where she would like the results of my sleep study faxed. She said "You've had one" Told her yep and if you people try and pull some crap to get me another one I have Higgins Law firm on speed dial. I was tested I was cleared, how goods your liability insurance?

Two year medical card. However Monday I have to go get a physical and when Susan went to schedule it they asked I go somewhere else. Going to some physicians medical center and she warned tem I have already passed a sleep test.

 

[Uncle Birchy]

so heres the story now in my saga. I am a big fat truck driver. I use a CPAP machine due to my sleep apnea. My machine is over 8 years old and wont give a printout of use. I take my recertification physical and the doctor says new government regulations require the use of a CPAP machine for any truck driver with a high BMI. She disqualified me until I get her a printout. So off I go to buy a new CPAP machine, wait a week, no pay of course, I went back to Concentra with my printout of usage on my new cpap machine. The doctor has me take another physical, just did it last week, and after it tells me my DMV report is only good for one week. Then come back with another printout, take another physical and get renewed for one month. Come back again in a month, bring printout, take physical, then come back every year. When I went back to the DMV I questioned them and they told me its not their policy, that once you clear the physical you come back every two years. Its the doctor who is forcing me to be off work for now will be one month, and then take five physicals in one year. So word of wisdom to any big driver like me is make sure you get a CPAP machine that has a printout or be screwed like I am. Or just lose the weight. But if you are phisically fit and still need a CPAP be prepared...


anyone else get screwed like this?

FIRST OFF you went to COCENTRA Occupational

COCENTRA is NOT YOUR PHYSICIAN second of all YOUR CARRIER sent you to CONCENTRA

NOW "You HAVE paperwork I Mead "DATED" both from your CAERIER and separate from Cocentra Clinics

 

[Injun]

@Tazz, what you had done was not a sleep study. You had a preliminary overnight oxygen level screening to see if you need a sleep study. You don't.

A sleep study consists of brain wave monitoring to see how much deep, restorative sleep you're getting, respiratory/oxygen/pulse monitoring and EKG to see how your heart responds in an apnic episode, if you have them. You are observed during sleep by technicians who note whether, how much and how loud you snore and, if you prove to be apnic, they fit you for a mask and titrate your pressure. If a person is apnic, a sleep study determines what type of apnea they suffer from, whether Obstructive or Central. The mechanisms are different and require slightly different treatments.

 

[Tazz]

@Tazz, what you had done was not a sleep study. You had a preliminary overnight oxygen level screening to see if you need a sleep study. You don't.

A sleep study consists of brain wave monitoring to see how much deep, restorative sleep you're getting, respiratory/oxygen/pulse monitoring and EKG to see how your heart responds in an apnic episode, if you have them. You are observed during sleep by technicians who note whether, how much and how loud you snore and, if you prove to be apnic, they fit you for a mask and titrate your pressure. If a person is apnic, a sleep study determines what type of apnea they suffer from, whether Obstructive or Central. The mechanisms are different and require slightly different treatments.

Yea but it countsso when they start their bs examination I can tell them stick it I have been tested Yeah I have a buddy drives here had to do that sleep bs. He actually likes his machine but after talking around got one of those jaw pieces to help with snoring so this last time around they said he no longer needed it. Now he can use it as he feels he needs it instead of that stupid printout 6 month approval bull squeeze.

 

[TruckerMiker]

Drivers there are clinics out there that wont force you to take a sleep study.
Once you get a CPAP, and participate in a compliance program, you are stuck.

Find a chiropractor, or "accident doctor" down the road from the clinic that
is trying to force you to sleep study. Yes, you may have to pay forty or sixty
bucks for the independent exam, but it is worth it to avoid the required CPAP.

I know there is one in the Phoenix Arizona are but OBVIOUSLY I
am not going to post his name.

 

[Tazz]

Drivers there are clinics out there that wont force you to take a sleep study.
Once you get a CPAP, and participate in a compliance program, you are stuck.

Find a chiropractor, or "accident doctor" down the road from the clinic that
is trying to force you to sleep study. Yes, you may have to pay forty or sixty
bucks for the independent exam, but it is worth it to avoid the required CPAP.

I know there is one in the Phoenix Arizona are but OBVIOUSLY I
am not going to post his name.

Unless your company mandates and pays for your physical, or you get caught Doctor shopping.