Friday, January 20, 2012

The Purpose of this Blog


The purpose of this blog is varied... First and foremost, a patient should be intimately involved in their care.  No one has higher stakes. Second, you are your best, and sometimes only, advocate. Taking a proactive approach to your own care is important in getting the best results.  Your doctor is a key aspect of that and should be consulted before taking any significant action, but they also have their limitations.  They often see you briefly, see you in a snapshot in time, but with the tools and technology available today you can gain a perspective of your condition(s) over time, in varying situations.  You can be more informed and can achieve a better treatment.

  • Important
    I want to understand sleep apnea
    so I can get the best treatment to avoid the fatal consequences (see My Story).  That's a great motivator!  This medical condition may have given me brain damage, I sense a loss in terms of doing complex work, and I'm doing my best to get back to my full potential.
    .
  • Interesting
    When Sleep Apnea revealed itself, I said, "Oh boy, you picked on the WRONG guy!"
    ... I'm a 20 year professional expert in analytics. Yes,
    I'm a data analysis geek extraordinaire of sorts and I have great tools available to me to analyze a myriad of data about the condition.  In addition to great tools, I have various equipment that gives me lots of interesting data about how I sleep:

    => a data capable APAP machine (ResMed S9 Autoset) that can tell me about breathing events (apneas of various sorts),

    => a reasonably affordable CMS50E pulse-oximeter that I can use to see my heart rate and oxygen saturation during the night and also

    => a Zeo Bedside unit.

    All of these I will be spending a lot of time talking about here.
    .
  • I want to better understand sleep so I can improve my rest, performance and well being.
    .
  • Oh, and Kind of Important
    I may have a mild form of narcolepsy and I'm trying to figure out if I actually have it or not before having a study to determine it via my doctor.
This blog chronicles my adventures...


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