You Should Avoid Concentra At All Costs & the Dreaded CPAP Diagnosis

When I hired on at Maverick 10 years ago they used concentra for their physicals. I was there two weeks for orientation and training. Both weeks they loaded the 13 passenger van down with all the biggest guys and 100% of us came back with cpap machines. That guy running the physicals was a savant at diagnosing Sleep apnea I guess. Definitely wasn’t anything shandy going on, sure the sleep study lab and Consentra were next door neighbors, but that’s not strange at all.

 

They've been that way for years, I think they went whole hog into sleep study then the first Trump administration didn't let it become part of the physical long after the DOT mentioned wanting to make it so.

They may let a company not participate in having their drivers 'pushed' into sleep studies but I'd bet most of their sales pitch is focused on the 'benefit' the company will have from chasing down the Apena rabbit hole.

My last position went 5 miles out of the way for physicals and drug/alcohol testing to avoid the nearby Concentra until our MRO merged into a larger firm and they required the newfangled electronic Chain of Custody "form" and we were forced to use Concentra for drug and alcohol; meanwhile we let our company guys use chiropractors that were registered with the DOT for physicals.

It's not a foolproof disease, we knew that one of our guys had Apnea from almost everyone catching him power-napping. One supervisor found him a lot snoozing at odd times and places. This guy was well under the body mass and collar size triggers.

 

Here’s the deal. Yes a thin petite person can have sleep apnea due to a narrow nasal passage or other factors but generally speaking more than 95% of people who suffer from sleep apnea can get rid of it by losing weight. The people in the sleep apnea/CPAP sleep study business will never tell you that. Maybe someone will, but they are far and few between. go on diet for six months and do some exercise and I almost guarantee you, you’ll get rid of sleep apnea. Furthermore, you don’t need a sleep study to know if you have it. Put your recorder on phones come with and record yourself sleeping overnight and then kind of scan through it. What you hear if you have sleep apnea will scare the living crap out of you. That’s what woke me up. Now I sleep as a baby all night long but I’ve lost the weight that I needed to. I lost about two years ago and I gained it back as soon as I hit a certain weight, loud snoring and gasping for air came right back. Lost weight again and it went away. This time I’m keeping it off. I literally don’t make a sound all night long. It just irritates me that more people don’t take their health into their own hands. All of these things that truck drivers suffer from are avoidable. it just takes a little self-discipline and dedication

we can’t sit all day and eat 4000 or more calories a day. Some of y’all are eating 4000 cal at one meal. And then you go sleep and then you get up and sit all day again. It’s just reality. If you’re not doing any exercise, you should be eating about 1500 to 2000 cal of nutrient dense food. And that’s it. most meals you buy out on the road probably have that many calories in them alone. And you’re eating those things and snacking all day and drinking soda. Combined with sitting, and they wonder why so many of us drop dead. On the days when I’m gonna get out and have time to walk 5 miles I’ll bump my calorie intake up to about 2000 maybe 2200. On the days when I’m not going to do anything physical I’ll only eat 1500 cal and it’s not snack food. It’s what most people term “Superfoods”

sleep apnea just like most other diseases that truck drivers get is avoidable. If you weren’t born diabetic and you develop it, it’s going to be your lifestyle. All it takes to break the bad habit? Is two weeks of self-discipline and the cravings go away and the way you eat becomes a habit. If you’re 50 pounds or more overweight, you can lose 15 to 20 pounds in a month. Then you’re off and running. Now you’ve got some motivation behind you.