Bi-Pap

We Can’t Hold Our Breath Until Philips Respironics Takes Real Action On Its Recalled Equipment

/ Ingrid Tischer / 1 Comment

Join Our National Call To Repair Or Replace Recalled Breathing Devices

Individuals who depend on recalled ventilators and other breathing devices manufactured by Philips Respironics have joined in a letter,  along with over two dozen disability organizations, demanding that Philips repair or replace the devices. The recall was announced in June, stating that the devices were found to release potentially harmful particles and gasses, but offering little information and no timeline for corrective action.

I’m among the affected individuals and have been part of a small group of users organizing a response with the support of the New York Law School and its Civil Rights and Disability Justice Clinic. “Respiratory equipment is not like a car that’s faulty. You can stop driving the car, but you can’t just postpone breathing. So we were given a really ridiculous thing that they called a choice, which was use it or don’t,” I told The Verge.

Update: Philips announced a repair and replacement program for one of their recalled models, the DreamStation, on September 1, 2021.

Take Action
  1. If you are affected by the recall and want to sign on to this open letter and/or speak to the media, complete this short form.
  2. Share this letter with your friends and family, elected representatives, and any media outlets who may not be aware of the recall.
  3. If you use social media, share your experiences with hashtag #SuckYouPhilips.

This is a graphic illustration by Haley Brown with a bright cobalt blue background. There are black lungs filled with dark gray puffy clouds. In the left lung is a yellow canary bird with a red eye in a mid-flight attack pose. In the right lung there is a red circle. Around the lungs there is clear white tubing that is entwined. Above this graphic the white text reads: #SuckYouPhilips

The full text of the group’s press release follows. Continue reading →

My FEDup™Rant: I Adjusted to Wearing a Face-Mask By Wearing a Face-Mask

/ Ingrid Tischer / 1 Comment
FED UP TM Ideas worth ranting about

I’m FEDup with people saying they can’t adjust to wearing masks even though they help protect lives during a pandemic.

If you have access to a mask but won’t wear it, take a #CripTip: Shift your narrative from, “I CAN’T ADJUST!” to “I will adjust and it will take time.”

I get it. Masks feel strange and uncomfortable. But unless you’re one of the relatively few who truly cannot physically tolerate wearing a mask, face shield, or other face covering, it’s not about whether you can. It’s about whether you want to.

Since you presumably want to save lives during a pandemic, the first step is dealing with what you’re telling yourself about wearing a mask and then, as needed, unpacking that typically messy box where emotions and physical feelings are stored in a jumble.

Note: I’m not addressing this to the, “But I shouldn’t HAVE to wear a mask and I won’t!” crowd. I have many skills but Fixing Selfish Magical Thinking isn’t one of them.

Ingrid wearing a colorful cloth face-mask, sitting next to a fuschia orchid

Photo credit: Christopher Egusa

Continue reading →

My FEDup™Rant: I Want to Be Envied

/ Ingrid Tischer / 1 Comment
FED UP TM Ideas worth ranting aboutI’m FEDup with aiming way too low.
I realized this after Congress voted this week to deny me the pleasure of peeing like non-disabled people do, which is to say, without having to do any kind of math, scheduling, or general advance planning when going out to public places.
But by being denied the minimum, I’ve learned to want everything.
You know what would be great? If I could be envied by non-disabled people.
Yes – envy’s bad! I shouldn’t want to be envied. I should want inclusion. Justice. Equality. I should want respect, love, acceptance.
Of course I want all that. But I want more.
I want to be envied by non-disabled people. Not admired. Envied.
Continue reading →

#IAmaPreexistingCondition Says NO to #AHCA and YES to Protecting People Not Profits

/ Ingrid Tischer / Leave a comment
Call, email, use social media to tell your Senators to vote NO on the AHCA:
Sample Script: “My name is ________________, and I’m calling to tell you that I oppose, and expect you to oppose, the American Health Care Act. We’re not going back to a pre – ACA era where insurers could ignore the needs of people with disabilities and pre – existing conditions and everyone was one medical emergency away from bankruptcy. If you value the health and well – being of your constituents, you must speak and vote against the AHCA.”
Transcript:
My name is Ingrid Tischer and I live in California.
My pre-existing condition is muscular dystrophy with chronic respiratory failure.
Without healthcare coverage for preexisting conditions, I wouldn’t have a machine called a Bi-PAP S/T and I would have died in my sleep a long time ago from carbon dioxide narcosis. 
I wouldn’t have been able to keep walking for as long as I did because I wouldn’t have had orthotics. 
I wouldn’t have been able to transition to a wheelchair when I finally needed to.
Because of this, I would tell my senators to vote NO on the AHCA and against any legislation that protects profits over people.
Including people with preexisting conditions.
I am a preexisting condition.

Thank you, Rooted in Rights and National Council on Independent Living (NCIL)!

Announcing #ADA26 as The Year of #SassingBack, #CripLit-Style

/ Ingrid Tischer / 1 Comment

 

Parody People magazine cover announcing NotPeople's Rationalest Man Alive! Peter Singer

Unlike Melania Trump, Tales From the Crip plagiarizes only its own material. In honor of the Americans with Disabilities Act’s 26th anniversary, TFtC is kicking off The Year of Sassing Back, #CripLit-Style by offering this gently-used excerpt from our first — and only! — NotPeople Magazine’s Imaginary Interviews With People Who We Wish Were Imaginary. Our own Respironics Bi-Pap S/T sat down with philosopher Dr. Peter Singer, Princeton’s Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics, whose anti-crip, pro-swine agenda argues that infanticide of babies with disabilities should be legal up until the 28th day after birth, that health care for people with disabilities should be rationed, and that the consciousness of some pigs doesn’t get enough respect. Happy ADA26! We’re not dead yet!

On the Love Secrets of the Utilitarian!

RBPS/T: Isn’t “No Rules, Just Rights” pretty much the mating call of the utilitarian?

PS: “If it feels good, do it,” is a much more rational mating call.

RBPS/T: What’s a common way for a utilitarian to get friend-zoned?

PS: A utilitarian could help a hot girl move and then she gets back together with her bass-player ex. Who’s a contemporary Continental phenomenologist.

RBPS/T: That sounds…nonhypothetical. And gender-biased. But hey, you are a philosopher.

PS: JUST BECAUSE WE’RE UTILITARIANS DOESN’T MEAN WE LIKE BEING USED.

RBPS/T: Hypothetically.

PS: It was a long time ago. I am completely and 110% over it. My happiness has never been more maximized. A random person might see me on this cover and think, “Wow, he is totally living the life he said he would and here I am, possibly married to but probably long-since-dumped by an untalented string player who distracted me from what my life could have been, and if something tragic happens like I get so horribly disfigured in an accident that I need expensive but ultimately futile treatments or I have an adorable but super sick baby — which wouldn’t be so unlikely if the weak genes of a contemporary Continental phenomenologist were involved in the uterine brew — I will most definitely not want societal resources wasted on prolonging our now-useless lives that are almost entirely composed of suffering moments that don’t include one single glimpse much less the infinitely tender touch of the brilliant moral pragmatist — pragmatic moralist? — I should have appreciated and who I secretly dream of providing me with his personal care and support at no cost to the public or to his individual liberty.” SHOW ME ONE TENURED “ARTIST,” SHEILA!

RBPS/T: No projection there.

PS: What’s projection?