Despite its challenges, providing respiratory care products and services is a niche that should be ripe with possibility, say health care industry experts such as David Shelledy, PhD, RRT, president of the American Association for Respiratory Care, Dallas.

“The demand for respiratory care is going to go up—perhaps dramatically,” he told attendees at the association’s 2002 convention in Tampa.

According to Dr Shelledy, about 15 million Americans have asthma while 16 million have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). In addition, there are about 4.8 million cases of pneumonia each year—and all of these numbers are expected to increase.

Plus, let us not forget the estimated 12 million US citizens with obstructive sleep apnea, as well as the potential future patients among the 47 million US adults and 4 million US adolescents who smoke.

Finally, add to these figures the growing US population and aging Baby Boomers, which could push the number of people over age 65 to more than 69 million by 2030, and the future for HME companies with a specialty in respiratory care would, on the surface, appear quite promising.

However, as anyone in the respiratory care business will tell you, while demographics and disease statistics may be on the side of respiratory care providers, health care funding is not. The Balanced Budget Act of 1997 cut reimbursement for home oxygen therapy by 30% and payment increases have been largely frozen since then despite the fact that the costs related to running a respiratory company—from the salaries of the respiratory therapists to the gas in the delivery vehicles—have continued to increase. As a result, companies must often make difficult choices about which of the products and services requested by patients and referral sources they can actually afford to provide.

To aid our readers who supply respiratory products and services, we invited respiratory industry experts Roberta Domos, RRT, Bob McCoy, RRT, and Kathleen M. Norulak, RRT, RCP, as well as billing expert Helen M. Farrell and legal expert Clay Stribling, JD, to contribute articles on various aspects of respiratory care for this special section of the magazine. We are pleased to offer their practical, how-to advice in the following pages.

—Lena Lindahl