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How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

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Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#181

Post by syndicatedjelly »

Moto7451 wrote: post #122
londons_explore wrote: post #33

Please folks remember that it isn't compulsory to use a companies byzantine process. Instead, check your insurance policy wording that you are covered, spend the money on a new machine, send a single letter to the insurer asking to be reimbursed, and when they don't reimburse within 30 days file in small claims court. They'll pay. They don't want to physically show up in court or have you send bailiffs to their HQ ov…

We lost my wife’s CPAP while traveling. Through insurance it would have been a month of paperwork, an exception made, and $600. Without insurance it was no wait and $650. Guess which way we went… I’m sorry the author had to deal with any of this. A lot of pandemic scarcity and multiple recalls made it hard to get supplies for a long time. My wife’s first CPAP is out of commission because the parts will simply never b…

If you need repairs done in the future, see if the local university’s biomedical engineering department has a student chapter of Project C.U.R.E. Students may volunteer to fix the device (off warranty of course). They work for free for needy families, and if you’re not in the former category, consider donating to their organization

https://projectcure.org/

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#182

Post by ncallaway »

yegle wrote: post #152

I too had my bad interaction with my insurance company. Out of blue they start rejecting my doctor's prescription for a very common (and cheap) medication. It took me more than 1 month with my awesome primary care doctor's persistent to figure out that the 1000mg version of my medication is the reason it got rejected. My doctor has to prescribe the 500mg version and I simply take two pills. But no communication from…

I think every denial from an insurance company (that’s denying care prescribed by a doctor), should be required to come from a named and licensed doctor, who is responsible for your care as if they are the treating physician (and thus subject to the same medical malpractice laws).

A denial should be required to come with either an alternate treatment plan, or an alternative diagnosis and treatment plan.

If a doctor issues a denial after reviewing your case for 3 seconds (as has happened in the past), they should be liable for medical malpractice lawsuits.

In your case, that would mean the denial would be required to come with an alternative treatment plan, which would say 2x500mg.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#183

Post by _qua »

NelsonMinar wrote: post #147

"Compliance" is the other half of the US insurance nightmare with CPAP. Often insurers demand access to logs of the machine to verify you are actually using it before they will reimburse you. CPAP machines have an elaborate tamper-proof logging mechanism including a cellular modem for data uploads outside your control. Largely to enable surveillance by US insurance companies. In addition to the surveillance being off…

As someone who treats people with CPAP, it’s absurd how many people get them and then don’t use them hardly at all. Yes there’s an adaptation period where you need to get used to using it, but you do need to use it for it to do anything. It doesn’t seem crazy for insurance to want to not keep paying for something that is sitting under a pile of clothes in the corner.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#184

Post by bugbuddy »

jawngee wrote: post #39

Yeah try importing a CPAP from the states into Vietnam if you want a real adventure. A $650 cpap machine costs well over $2K here. So I thought I'd import one. Apparently you need a prescription in the states? Ok, get a "prescription" from an online service that basically just asks you if you snore over a video call. Amazing. Buy machine and have it sent to a freight forwarding service. They fuck up the paperwork. It…

Your mistake was not bringing an envelope full of USD as evidence to be submitted to the relevant authority to expedite the service. Guess why it costs over $2k? Additional administrative taxes included. Also, you are supposed to do this through somebody that knows somebody that works somewhere.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#186

Post by steve-atx-7600 »

I'm fortunate enough to afford to buy my machines out of pocket. Just trying to obtain a machine the insurance way was taking weeks (before covid even) and I got pissed off and figured out with my Perscription I could buy one on cpap.com with Amazon like service. However, obtaining the equipment was just the first hurdle for me. Thereafter, I approached finding the right settings as a search problem and eventually got some relief. Since I was not a severe case - at least by the "average of bad events" metric from the machine - I wasn't able to get much attention after trying several providers. I eventually bought a bipap machine after reading forums and hoping that more knobs to turn on the machine could yield better results. This helped a lot and again I'm lucky to be able to afford a new one without insurance. There's a lot of opportunity for improvement in this medical tech space.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#187

Post by lepus »

dmazzoni wrote: post #170

I use Kaiser Permanente as my health care provider. For those who aren't aware, it's one of the few "integrated care" providers in the U.S., meaning they act as both the health insurance and health care provider. Now, Kaiser is FAR from perfect - they have their share of problems. But....this sort of nightmare is not one of them. With Kaiser, doctors are free to prescribe whatever they think is medically necessary, a…

That works sometimes, but you could still get screwed if that out of pocket care is wildly expensive. A friend of mine needed a drug that costs about $85k total but was the only effective treatment at the time, and Kaiser doctors told him they wouldn't prescribe it until his condition started giving him organ failure(!), so he had to switch insurance to get it and luckily the timing worked out.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#188

Post by anonu »

I ended up just buying a CPAP. Ultimately, its not easy to sleep with one. I use a MAD now and my experience has been substantially better in terms of persistence in using it and less snoring. However, it has caused my teeth to move which is a tradeoff I can deal with.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#189

Post by diob »

dralley wrote: post #85
robmccoll wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have terrible news about systems built on private health insurance (USA): it will still take 666 days to see a specialist, and you will need a referral from your PCP who may also decide they want to see you in person first. This may be its own scheduling nightmare. Then you may find out that your preferred specialist is out of network for your private insurance. The waits are a generally a supply and demand issue m…

I've never had to wait more than a month to see a specialist in the US

When was the last time you went? Nearly everything, even non-specialist, are booked out a month or more.

Re: How to Replace Your CPAP in Only 666 Days

#190

Post by seattle_spring »

tomohawk wrote: post #78

Alternatively, try a low histamine diet. Many people who have been told they need surgery to correct "deviated septum" or need cpap have found their problems go away. Edit: to downvoters - why the closed mind?

> Edit: to downvoters - why the closed mind?

Unsolicited medical advice is not appropriate. It suggests that the people suffering from the condition in question have put literally zero effort into solving their problem, when in reality they likely have already heard about and tried every "trick" or "alternative treatment" you're going to suggest.

Other common scenarios:

* Telling a chronic pain sufferer to "just try cannabis, it works better than pharmaceutical pain killers!"

* Suggesting [common behavioral quirk] is a very obvious sign of ADHD, and encouraging them to take Adderall.

* A whole host of "x supplement fixes y chronic condition" suggestions.

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