Dr. Carol Gill and the Vivo 45 LS

A Person-Centered Ventilator Contributes to a Whole Life

Breas spoke with Dr. Carol Gill, Professor Emeritus, Disability and Human Development at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and previously a clinical psychologist and the director of rehabilitation psychology at a hospital in Los Angeles, California. She is busy as a wife and a grandmother who loves organic gardening and classic movies. Dr. Gill uses a Breas Vivo 45 LS ventilator under the direction of Dr. Lisa Wolfe with the home ventilation care provided by Health Care Solutions Group of Chicago.

As a child, Dr. Gill contracted polio and has lived with polio related disabilities for most of her life. A ventilator was not needed until she developed sleep apnea in middle age. After years of nocturnal ventilation, she realized the need for daytime ventilatory support to help with fatigue and airway clearance. She consulted with Dr. Wolfe and her home care provider and was recommended to try daytime use of Vivo 45 LS with the mouthpiece ventilation feature.

Dr. Gill’s own experiences with disability clearly has prepared her for her life’s work in disability studies that “focus on the complexity of disability.”

“Everybody thinks they kind of know what disability is but it’s a lot more than meets the eye. It’s not just a physical or mental impairment inside of the person, inside of the individual. In disability studies, we look at disability as created by the interaction between the person and society. So disability studies scholars are interested in how people with disabilities have been categorized; how we’ve been treated as different from and often inferior to other people [when] we function or appear outside the norm. And we look at disability as more of a social status or even an identity which in many ways is analogous to gender, race, ethnic, and cultural identities. We’re interested in the history, cultural values, and even political aspects of disability rather than just looking at the physiological part of things. …We tend to view disability as an interesting and valid way of life rather than viewing it as pathological or something that always needs to be cured.”

“With Vivo, I feel like it’s there breathing with me. You know, we’re on the same page. …It’s taking its cues from me and yet giving me what it’s been programmed to do well. It has its expertise and I have mine.”

Dr. Gill tells someone who is considering the Vivo 45 LS, “I believe they’ll find that it facilitates their lifestyle. It’s that they’re going to have a

much easier time incorporating it into their lifestyle than other options. I mean there are other small and lightweight vents but this one … is the first one that seems to address all of the issues I’ve had.”

In the short time using the Vivo 45 LS, Dr. Gill reports that her CO₂ levels have gone down, and she feels more energetic. “My blood tests have shown that I’m doing better on expelling carbon dioxide. So my stats are getting better.”