Well my doctor did it and found a place for me to get O2.  They dropped off an "H" tank on Tuesday and the guy only had a regulator that went to 8  He must of saw I was getting a bit upset and ready to cry and called to have someone else bring me a new one that went to 15.  The person on the phone most of said something stupid about what was the problem because I heard him said "This girl has clusters she needs the 15 so get someone out here now".  I was never so happy to see the guy show up with the new regulator. 

I have been doing OK with the hits being somewhat controlled with the O2 and the Imitrex.  Here's my question.  Does anyone know a way of knowing how much time I have with this tank?  I know it only would be a guess based on how much I use it but I was just wondering if it could be based on hrs and I could then break it down to know if an "H" tank would last me a week if I used it a certain amount of time a day.

Also isn't there a travel tank that I could use?  I'm told no but I know I had a travel tank last go around.  They told me that nothing would accommodate a 15 lpm air flow.

Sami

You can calculate how long it'll last by knowing how much it holds divided by your flow rate.

Go here and type in the numbers:

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Or,

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Samiam wrote on Jan 13^th, 2011 at 7:30pm:

Also isn't there a travel tank that I could use?  I'm told no but I know I had a travel tank last go around.  They told me that nothing would accommodate a 15 lpm air flow. Sami

That would be either a D or an E tank.  You are dealing with absolute morons!  They told you a bunch of asinine garbage!

check the oxygen info button on the left.  You will find all the info you need for it there.  I would suggest you go on EBAY and find a regulator that will go to at least 25 lpm and you will probably keep the trex only for emergencies.  If you don't find a 25 lpm regulator that is priced reasonably get a welding regulator and use it.  You will need an inexpensive adapter to fit the tubing on.

Jerry

Hey Sami,

Your "H" tank should provide 7 hours at a flow rate of 15 liters/minute provided it was charged to at least 2250 psi.

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The real question is how many cluster headache aborts can you get out of that big jolly green hummer?  The answer depends on your average abort time at a flow rate of 15 liters/minute. 

We have data collected by several CH'ers at a flow rate of 15 liters/minute that indicates an average abort time of 20 minutes for cluster headaches all pain levels up 9 on the 10-Point headache pain scale. 

We also have data from folks using oxygen flow rates that support hyperventilation (roughly 30 liters/minute) that indicates an average abort time of 7 minutes for the same pain levels.

Using these figures and assuming you start the oxygen therapy as soon as possible and use an O2PTIMASK™ kit from the CH.com store at the left, you might be able to get an average of 30 to 35 aborts out of your "H" tank at a flow rate of 15 liters/minute.  If you start late and use the disposable NRB mask with 1-liter reservoir bag the home oxygen folks delivered, that figure could easily drop to between 20 to 25 aborts.

I use M-size oxygen cylinders with roughly half the oxygen content of your "H" tank configured with a 0 to 60 liter/minute regulator and hyperventilate with an O2PTIMASK™  With this setup, I average 25 aborts with a max of 30 and min of 20 from a single M-size oxygen cylinder.

Check your email for more info.

Take care,

V/R, Batch

Thanks so much for the info.  Yes I am dealing with morons but that's to be expected since I believe 69 out of 100,000 of us suffer from Clusters.   Many just don't understand or even care what we do and why many of us have the attitude of sucking it up when they complain of a headache that one advil will kill.  I could scream.  I even had a guy tell me he understood completely the pain I was in I should just take 2 advil and rest in a dark room.  If I was larger I would have thrown him out the window.

Batch that's for taking the time to send me the paper on the O2 therapy.   I going to read this further and read more on the website.  There is so much more info that I should keep up with.

I gotta tell you that it's this site that gets me through those days that I feel I'm going to lose my mind.

Sami