Porta Lung vs. Alternative Negative Pressure Methods

In my opinion the Porta-Lung is better than Bi-PAP for people with chronic respiratory problems because the Porta-Lung is restful and breathes for you so you don’t have to worry about breathing on your own. My biggest fear is going to sleep and to stop breathing during a deep slumber. So I choose to be on a ventilator that I KNOW will consistently breathe for me to (mentally) allow me to sleep. I don’t want to have to consciously tell myself to breathe 24/7 with my compromised respiratory system. Bi-PAP is great for those with respiratory diseases like asthma where the patient only needs a ventilator for periods of time but I’m not really convinced it is good for long term respiratory patients who depend on ventilators for breathing assistance. Bi-PAP is mostly used in sleep apnea cases and as a transitory means of ventilation – where the patient goes from intubation to weaning off a respirator. With Bi-PAP ventilation the positive pressure generated by the ventilator, combined with the negative pressure produced by the inspiratory muscles, produce a flow. This means that the machine depends somewhat on the patient’s breathing muscles to produce the negative pressure effect that is required. If you depend on my lungs to produce a negative pressure for too long, you will witness the decrease of oxygen and the lungs going flat - like a tire being deflated. When I did a sleep study for CPAP, I flunked…didn’t sleep a wink. The reason being, I was stressed and the machine didn’t feel good. I imagine the same results would occur if I tried Bi-PAP. Bi-PAP sounds like it is basically a positive pressure ventilator without the tubes. The Porta-Lung is about 97% negative pressure with 3% positive pressure which really is more compatible with the human respiratory system. The Porta-Lung never fails – it’s as steady as the day is long.