Sleep Apnea,,,,,,,,The disease de jour. I remember it wasn't so long ago when everyone was running around wearing wrist braces for Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Even cartoonists were putting their characters in them! With 28 years on the job in LE in a major metropolitan city that investigated all deaths that occurred outside of a hospital, not once did anyone I know of die from sleep apnea. Not saying it does not happen, but none during my 28 years. They were all a result of another form of medical condition. We had one infant SID death and one auto accident where an older gentleman died while driving his car due to a heart attack. I figure the odds of something like this killing me to be pretty remote. Sleep study testing/treatment is very expensive and profitable for the medical profession and if insurance did not cover it, the medical profession would move on to something else. There are alternate solutions to those that DO suffer from a legitimate SA diagnosis instead of the CPAP machine and that is a specially designed mouth appliance you wear at night. My building/aviation buddy is a retired dentist who had the training and equipment necessary to treat SA with an appliance he would make for the patient, very similar to a nighttime bite guard. A local sleep clinic would refer patients to him who would not, or could not, bear wearing the CPAP contraption at night. He had good success with most his patients.