How to Use Oxygen at Home Print E-mail



Is It Inevitable?

No. Some COPD patients eventually need supplemental oxygen. Some never do. If you reach the point where adding oxygen to the air you breathe will help you, your doctor will let you know.

In the group of patients requiring supplemental oxygen, needs differ. Some benefit only during strenuous activity, some need it only at night (when ventilation normally diminishes), some need it both times. And some need extra oxygen continuously, meaning all day and night. How much extra oxygen is added to a patient's air at any given moment depends on the oxygen demands of what he is doing then.

How Does Your Doctor Know If You Need It?

In most cases, the criteria that guide your doctor's decision about prescribing supplemental oxygen are very clear-cut. They depend on the amount of oxygen in your arterial blood. If this concentration falls below a specific point, or if it falls within a middle range and you also have cor pulmonale, he will want you to have oxygen therapy.

What Changes Will You Experience?

You will have more energy, generally feel better, and be sharper mentally. You will be able to resume activities that had become too strenuous for you. And you will have the stamina to participate in a rehabilitation program designed especially for COPD patients, which is critically important in helping you get the most you can out of your life despite your disease. If you have developed pulmonary hypertensionmeaning that the blood vessels in your lungs have become narrowedthe added oxygen will relax these vessels. Because the blood passing through your lungs then circulates much more freely, your heart no longer has to strain to push it through.

Some Patients Refuse Oxygen Therapy

We want to underline the importance of hanging onto a well-balanced perspective when your doctor tells you he wants you to use oxygen regularly at home. Many patients try to turn a deaf ear, even when they hear the statistics providing they will live longer, far more comfortably, and in better health if they add oxygen to their "diet."

One objection has to do with how they fear other people will react to them. Will people find them unattractive with their oxygen equipment? Will they be regarded as an invalid? Will any of this make them unacceptable to others?

The other objection has to do with how they see themselves. People with a chronic, progressive illness often deny its seriousness in that very human attempt to turn a blind eye to their own mortality. Accepting his doctors determination that he needs extra oxygen during his daily activities forces a COPD patient to acknowledgeif he hasn't yet done so the inroads his illness has made on his health. Ironically, refusing supplemental oxygen will bring about the very thing he is trying to avoid. We don't want to beat around the bush. If your doctor advises oxygen therapy and you refuse, you will probably die sooner, and the time left you will be far more restricted and uncomfortable.

If you find yourself intent on avoiding your confrontation with reality, we hope you will agree to a one-month trial run. In any case, it is recommended that COPD patients starting oxygen therapy be retested after four weeks of oxygen use. Some patients turn out to need only this temporary "zap." After four weeks their oxygen level is adequate, and remains so for some time. If you agree to a trial, then find you still need supplemental oxygen after that month, we hope your taste of oxygens benefits will have helped you disentangle your anxieties from this profoundly helpful treatment.


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