Confusing guidelines on sleep apnea shared frustration, says sleep doc
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is still collecting data on sleep apnea testing and treatment and will come up with new guidelines by the end of the calendar year but no new measures are in place, Dr. Rochelle Goldberg emphasized.
By DOROTHY COX
The Trucker Staff
7/20/2010
It’s not only truckers who are frustrated by the “combination of confusing guidelines” on sleep apnea testing and treatment, said a sleep doctor Monday night during a call-in discussion with truckers on the subject.
Making the comment was Dr. Rochelle Goldberg, president of the board of the American Sleep Apnea Association, the patient support organization with which the Truckers for a Cause chapter of A.W.A.K.E. is affiliated.
She said she wanted to set the record straight that currently there are only guidelines, not law, governing sleep apnea testing and treatment for truckers.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is still collecting data and will come up with new guidelines by the end of the calendar year but no new measures are in place, she emphasized.
She said FMCSA recognizes there are no specifics on testing and treating sleep apnea and that the agency is planning a national registry for medical examiners with new language and they’re asking for new information, how to use sleep apnea evaluations and how to get more people tested and treated for the disorder.
“As a sleep doctor I look first at the health risk to the individual; I can’t look the other way and forget the fact that untreated sleep apnea can hurt you, your blood pressure, your heart …,” she said.
In response to a question by a trucker regarding the lack of “good solid research” linking untreated sleep apnea and crash risks, Goldberg said “it’s a fair question” and also “a shared frustration” on the lack of further data on the subject.
“Part of the frustration is that people are trying to put new regulations in place with partial information,” she said. And partial information “is not stopping that train from moving on.”
Both truckers and Goldberg urged sleep apnea sufferers who are in compliance by using their CPAP machines but who have been denied employment or fired by a carrier, contact the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and file a complaint.
Goldberg also said truckers with grievances of that nature should get a letter-writing campaign started and get a sleep doctor to provide information that the driver is in fact getting treatment for sleep apnea and being “in compliance” by using a CPAP machine. Compliance “reduces health risks” for the driver and the industry needs to be made aware of that, she said.
She added that these problems with employment and sleep apnea are not unique to truckers but to other workers as well.
“There’s quite a broad battle” going on over it, she said. “Treatment has to be factored into employability and safety and risk factors.”
To find out more go to http://awake.truckersforacause.com/.
Dorothy Cox of The Trucker staff may be contacted to comment at dlcox@thetrucker.com.