Dr Halstrom Sleep Apnea and Snoring Clinic

Several years ago I was recommended by my dentist to visit Dr. Halstrom’s sleep apnea treatment facility in Burnaby, near Vancouver (where he was located at the time). My dentist suggested that I might have sleep apnea as I was grinding my teeth at night. However, I’m a self-​confessed, youthful fitness fanatic with 5% body fat and therefore don’t fit the conventional profile of a person with sleep apnea i.e. a seriously overweight middle-​aged man.
I mentioned this to Dr. Halstrom when I first met with him. And he immediately agreed that I likely had sleep apnea. I thought his «instant diagnosis» (or assumption) was odd considering that we had only been talking for about a minute. What came next was even more odd. He immediately sat me down in a dentist’s chair and took an imprint of my teeth so that he could order a customized $ 2,300 plastic mouth guard device to help with sleep apnea that he calls «The Silencer.»
Almost as an apparent after-​thought, he sent me home with a device that attaches to one’s finger while a person sleeps to measure his/​her heart rate. This is supposed to determine if a person has sleep apnea. I returned the device the next day. And a few days later, surprise, surprise: I received word that I had been diagnosed with «borderline» sleep apnea.
So Dr. Halstrom gleefully handed over my «Silencer» soon thereafter. And that was that — or so it seemed. The problem was that the device didn’t really seem to work. And when I removed it each morning, its horrible smell was enough to make me gag.
I told Dr. Halstrom what the problem was. And he basically didn’t seem to care. He had been paid and apparently that was all that mattered to him. He refused at the time to do anything about it.
At that point, I went to see him and threatened to go to the media with my story. After some haggling, he eventually handed over a cheque for $ 1,250, which was all that he was prepared to refund me. He reasoned that the device cost him $ 800 to have manufactured. And he also said he still felt entitled to make a profit from the 90 minutes or so in total that I had spent in his office. So he kept the remaining approximately $ 250. In return, he insisted that I didn’t go to the media. I honoured our agreement.
However, a few weeks ago I had cause to have two more sleep apnea tests (the same kind as with Dr. Halstrom) that were conducted at a differently sleep apnea clinic. And lo and behold: The results came back negative.
I do not have sleep apnea, not even the so-​called «bordeline» kind that Dr. Halstrom suggested I had in order to sell me his over-​priced gizmo. (By the way you, can buy similar devices online for as little as $ 20, albeit ones made from a cheaper kind of plastic).
So the moral of this story/​post is that you may want to get a second opinion when dealing with this doctor, who I believe is over-​zealous in his efforts to convince potentially gullible patients (like me) that they need his expensive «Silencer.»
Caveat Emptor!
By the way, my sleep issues seem to be getting resolved ever since I recently stopped eating wheat. And that’s another story that I don’t really need to get into.