After Four Failed Machines it is Clear - RESMED SUCKS

[Akhenaten33]

We just had our fourth ResMed CPAP fail in the household. They all fail after about 2-4 years. They begin to either have no control the airflow and just blow at max pressure constantly, or the pressure falls off to minimum and no airflow can be detected no matter what setting the unit is put on...

And the real kicker is - you endanger your career/school/health because you have no idea that you are having breathing trouble, as there is no warning from the machine - that it is malfunctioning.  

Your wife and family just begin to spot that your face is red and swollen, and you feel lethargic every day and your boss points it out.

What kind of sick a**h*le designs a CPAP machine in this manner? Each time, we get around 2 to 4 years of use for the below machines. Then we send them off to be refurbished and sold.

1. S8
   
2. S8 Autoset Vantage
   
3. S8 Escape II
   
4. S9 Elite
   

All pieces of sh*t.

I am never ordering anything from ResMed again...  Just sent off the S9 for refurb, so we can sell it ...

A33

[Sleeprider]

Thank goodness you are using a Dreamstation. How many hours on the S9?

[Akhenaten33]

4,180 hours on the Escape II.

All the rest were right in this range, but not everyone in the house monitored hours like I did.

Yes, I like my Dreamstation. Each time we have a ResMed fail in the house, we get one of those to replace it.

[SarcasticDave94]

I've heard of a lot more Respironics that fail sooner than the ResMed, as well as Respironics giving poor therapy. I see yours fail at 4k or so hours.
FWIW the S8s and S9s are machines that haven't been in production for 5 or more years. It seems like that needs to be accounted in reliability to the degree these are older machines.

[Phaleronic]

That's interesting, I see quite a few people on here saying that Phillips Dreamstation machines don't provide the same level of therapy as ResMed machines, but I have been very happy with my Dreamstations, my first machine had 15 thousand hours on it without any issues before I sold it.

[SarcasticDave94]

I think the effectiveness is somewhat split, not exactly 50/50. Most do tend to do better right off the bat with a ResMed than the Respironics. Some like Respironics slower pressure transitions however. It's down to the "fatal flaw" as I call it, Respironics has to be very closely adjusted settings to be on top of your therapy sweet spot due to they are slower to respond. There's in the mix an older algorithm that has been used basically untouched for the past few generations of machines. ResMed has a faster algorithm on adjusting itself within setting parameters and there's been algorithm changes over the machine generations more than Respironics. We've even seen OSCAR data from individuals switching from Respironics to ResMed and the difference is very noticeable in a positive way.

[staceyburke]

Well I will put in my 2 cents - I had a dreamstation bipap for 5 years. I got help here but no matter what settings I used I had 22 to 25 events a night. I switch to a ResMed VAUTO and the events went WAY down. In fact the last 5 nights were 0.

I ca not speak for durability but the therapy is day and night difference between them.

[SuperSleeper]

Sad that you've had bad luck with those machines.  I'm hoping this is a relatively isolated series of failures, or at least a group of failures that isn't that common.

It's also important to note that one person's bad luck with particular brand does not (by itself) indicate a trend.  To see an actual trend, we'd have to get several other people saying the same thing.  Time will tell, I suppose.  Not discounting or debunking what that OP is saying at all.  I believe that it actually did happen the way he described.  We'll have to keep an eye on things and see if other failures start popping up on a regular basis.


Thanks for posting, Akhenaten33.

[Akhenaten33]

Continuing this Thread, with more experience under my belt.

1. Phillips and ResMed machine Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) performance is abysmally short (they fail too fast). This is unacceptable. With 2 members suffering apnea in our household, we are on machine 13 now. An average family in the US cannot suffer this kind of egregious household expense hit, simply as a result of schemes from equipment vendors to sell more sh*t.

Really, ~4000 hours to have a series of machines start to selectively and surreptitiously reduce functionality, this is just about a year and a half's use and is inexcusable for something which costs $700 - 2500. Apparently the manufacturers think that everyone is getting these things paid for by healthcare plans, so - what's the harm? With two persons in my household, the cost of this amounts to buying a new machine every year and a half. I looked at my purchase history at the CPAP shop - and sure enough 4 machines in the last 5 years. 2 Phillips and 2 ResMed.

If this were any other industry, I would deem this to be a mafia-driven sourcing chain. It is inexcusable that this incestuous abuse of customers continues. No one is apparently being held accountable at these companies.

Then today I see on my Respironics DreamStation, that I have like 5 failure codes on the Performance Test. However, I guess these really mean nothing from what I am reading. Besides, I have around 3300 hours on the unit. I am looking very much forward to having to purchase another new one in 6 months or so.

Question:  Is there a service or place who can refurbish a machine to its full original working condition (firmware and software as well) so that the machine can be used more than 4,000 hours? Any reference to a credible refurbish service would be greatly appreciated.

2. When these units fail, they selectively eliminate a feature like actual pressure peak or pulse functionality - it is not really a 'failure' of a component. These are insidious failures as the user is not aware and just suffers the life degradation (severe headaches and lost time from work, foggy-headed, accidents, etc.), and the user eventually figures out that life sucks because their BiPAP/APAP is not really working when it says that it is working...  This is inexcusable as well. Most recent cases in point:

1. Today We have a ResMed machine in the house as well which says it is pumping at a given pressure, but in reality is pumping far below that pressure when we compare it to the same settings on a new machine. This confounds user ability to figure out what is wrong by examining OSCAR data. Everything looks fine. AHI just sucks and the user is miserable from lack of REM sleep.  New machine and REM sleep jumps from 10 minutes - to 2 hours and 10 minutes in just one night.  This is inexcusable.
   
2. We had two machines which indicated on OSCAR software that they were issuing pressure pulses in response to detected clear airway apnea and hypopnea events. But in reality they were not really issuing the pulses at all. REM sleep is about 5% on average, when it should be ~20% or more. This is inexcusable. The life-cost is very hard to measure on this.
   

One spends weeks ordering new masks and hoses only to find out that the MACHINE has selectively quit functioning... the motors do not fail, rather it is invariably a subtle feature which is turned off or adjusted for some reason by the machine's control system - one which does not endanger your life, but just makes you miserable - a waste of health, time, and money. In each case above, we looked back in the OSCAR data and the change in performance happened in ONE DAY.  AHI = .002 for months, then suddenly AHI = ~4.2 from that day onward.

In other words, these functions are being selectively turned off in the operating system - and are not a malfunction of a mechanical device. I know what such things look like when they occur, and these are not component failures.

We really deserve better from this incestuous industry. They say we should get a new machine every five years. Baloney. There is no reason these machines cannot last for 20,000+ hours - if we had competent or ethical designers and manufacturers. We certainly should NOT be purchasing them every 1 or 2 years per user.

After 13 machines all doing the same thing, the claim that I am just unlucky and everyone else gets 5+ years out of these machines no longer holds water. This is the notorious '2000 hour light bulb argument'. In that a 2000 hour light bulb can last 'as long as 2000 hours' with the reality being ~400 to 1100 hours along a logarithmic curve which asymptotes at 2000 hours. Of course this being by design to sell more bulbs - until class-action complaints forced the industry to come clean and stop such abuse.

As a systems engineer who monitors systems and component failures professionally - I KNOW what I am looking at, and these CPAPs are selectively failing by design. These are not component failures.

Question:  Has there been a class-action complaint filed by victims against these companies, not only in terms of cost, but the life injury from functionality being selectively shut off by design, just to turn more machine sales? I would be interested in joining one, because I have a serious harm and cost tally to date.

Thanks,
Akhenaten33

[Gideon]

Ok, post charts.
Please I close 2 minute zooms of pro lem areas and where the pressure pulses are not showing