I need transportation for a friend who is on oxygen and unable to carry the tank herself. Can you assist me with this please. My friend can walk but cannot carry the oxygen tanks as they are too heavy. She needs to be on oxygen constantly so she needs to use the larger tanks that are way too heavy for her to carry.
1. Search to locate the Lewiston, Maine, or closest largest public transit agency. Contact it and ask if it has paratransit, dial-a-ride, small bus, or other point-to-point service. These smaller buses typically are wheelchair equipped with a driver who can assist people with needs to get on the bus.
The driver, if he/she is allowed to come up and into the house, could put the oxygen tank into the carrier and wheel it out. In my area, the costs are quite reasonable.
2. Some senior centers affiliate with the public transit agency to provide transportation, so check with your Lewiston or closest senior center to see if this is an option.
3. However, these vehicles may be limited to destinations within a certain range, such as 10 miles, or within the city/township limits.
4. There are other paratransit companies, for profit, but the charges for transit would be much more.
5. There is another option that’s more user friendly; there are portable oxygen concentrators that are much smaller, lighter and more maneuverable than the cylinders.
Google “portable oxygen concentrators” – there are at least 2 companies I know of that provide these. One provides them through Medicare DME contractors.
6. Your friend’s pulmonary doctor might have to become involved in writing a script for the portable concentrator as opposed to just the tanks.
7. The concentrator is operated on lithium-ion batteries, with a pouch on the jacket cover for an extra battery. I always carry a second back-up battery, and have a car charger as well.
8. The maintenance required would be the charging of the batteries, but that’s fairly easy.
9. Your friend still might have the lifting issue, and may still have to have assistance for that; this is where the type of transit you locate comes into play. When you call different agencies or companies, ask specifically if they'll come into the house to put either the cylinder in its carrier and carry it out for your friend, or if they'll carry out a portable concentrator.
For portable oxygen concentrators, there are no insurance exclusions. If there were an accident, however, and the concentrator was ejected from my car and exploded, I would be liable. In addition, replacement of the concentrator wouldn't be covered.
I might see if I can add an endorsement for that. Those concentrators run from $2K to about $3.5K in cost.
Adding my own thoughts from auto neg experience, if someone approached the concentrator with a lit cigarette, opened can of gas, or other inflammatory object, and that precipitated an explosion, the issue of liability might be clouded but there definitely would be contributory negligence on the part of the smoker or gas can holder.
And it might turn on the cause of the accident as well, especially if I was rear ended by a texting driver. Interesting concepts...
The police officer with whom I spoke had not heard of being required to have placards in the car and checked the Michigan State Police Traffic Code, which mentioned oxygen only in 2 respects:
1. Persons on oxygen, with specific criteria, are considered disabled. I wasn't aware of that. In fact that might be enough to get a disabled parking permit.
2. An oxygen tank secured to a wheelchair is considered in compliance when on a school bus, provided that the two do not block access to exits.
Since I'm well past the age of riding school buses, that isn't a concern.
And since OceanLover's friend is seeking transportation, and OceanLover apparently is not able to provide it, I'm assuming that the friend is looking for transportation that includes someone carrying the tank. Other than public transit, that would be commercial transit.
Having worked in public transit, I can attest to concern for liability on many levels. And I'm sure responsible owners of a commercial transit method for disabled or compromised people would have had to have this addressed in their own commercial vehicle policies.
Interesting topic for oxygen use.
For security reasons, I have been logging out each time because of trolls.
Since you would be first on-scene to confront or discover a troll, would it make sense that you would be targeted? I think I have noticed a troll-team working on here, often. One starts, the others disclose their true intentions later.
Wish someone could post guidelines for trolls-meant to identify them early and ignore or report them.
I also log out every time I leave.
As to the you know whats, I hadn't noticed the tag team approach, but I'll be on the lookout for it. There seems to have been a lot of strange posts with similar themes lately.
As to the original poster, I don't think she'll be back. I think she thought this was a forum, as have others, that made arrangements for people rather than providing information for them to take action for themselves.
If you leave the box before posting your comment, it will be lost.
In my experience, even going back to previous page will lose the draft.
Where do you write it? Why do you keep a copy?
I don't keep a copy until I've posted it here; then I just delete it. I began to do this with complex questions requiring complex answers because it's just too hard to conceive what I want to write in this little box. And, too often I'll switch screens to check out something for an answer and forget to just open another screen. Then I lose everything if I've forgotten to copy it from here first.
Thanks Garden Artist!