What are the Dot Sleep Apnea Guidelines?

Posted By EightNine On 24th April 2011

Sleep apnea is a fairly common condition which in come cases can be a serious safety issue. The biggest single group who pose a safety concern is truck drivers. It is quite common for people with sleep apnea to feel sleepy during the day. Obviously this is a major safety issue if you are driving a truck. In order to address this there are now DOT sleep apnea guidelines that truck drivers have to meet.

The DOT sleep apnea guidelines were created because the Department of Transportation has real concerns about the safety impact of the condition. What concerns them is that one of the symptoms of sleep apnea is a feeling that you are sleepy during the day, this is hardly something that you want when you are driving a big truck. Therefore the DOT has created guidelines that make it necessary for truck drivers to be screened for sleep apnea as part of getting your license. While this has been helpful there are a lo of people who believe that the guidelines don’t go far enough.

One of the concerns with the DOT sleep apnea guidelines is that the diagnoses of the condition is based solely on a questionnaire. Before signing off on your medical for your license your doctor will ask you a series of questions that are intended to help them determine if you have sleep apnea. The problem is that a successful diagnosis is going to depend on the trucker giving honest answers to the questions that he is being asked. Given that his license and his livelihood are on the line the chances that he will honestly answer questions that could lead to a diagnosis of sleep apnea are pretty slim.

While there are a lot of people who believe that the DOT sleep apnea guidelines don’t go far enough and would like a more thorough exam nobody is entirely sure how you would do something like that. The questionnaire is the standard approach to diagnosing sleep apnea. The only way to get a definitive diagnosis would be to do a sleep study. While this would certainly make it more clear whether or not the driver had the condition giving a sleep study is a major investment of time and money. It is hardly practical to give one to every truck driver every time they need to renew their license.

There are some people who think just the opposite, that not only is it not necessary for stricter DOT sleep apnea guidelines but that the ones that currently exist are counter productive. The belief here is that by putting the truckers license at risk if he is diagnosed with sleep apnea it gives him a reason to cover it up. That means that he likely won’t seek treatment if he does have a problem. That of course results in more drivers on the road who have sleep apnea, which is the opposite of what the guidelines were supposed to achieve.

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