Traveling with oxygen

[goofy4wdw2]

My father is terminally ill and is now requiring oxygen. His greatest wish is to go to Disney World with his grandchildren. This is likely a long shot and may not be feasible due to his condition and energy level anyway, but does anyone have any experience traveling with oxygen for a few days? Not sure if that is possible with flying and then the issue of portable tanks while in Florida (we are in Pennsylvania). Any input would be greatly appreciated.

 

[jmartinez1895]

Many people travel with O2 everyday and with the right planning it can be done with very little stress. The first thing that needs to be done is to contact the doctor. Also contact your airline to find out what types of O2 they will fly and to get the forms that the doctor needs to fill out. Most of the time they will fly a concentrator and then you can have one of the local medical companies deliver tanks to the resort for him to use. At our house we use tanks and a concentrator, but for travel our doctor has approved my son to just use the concentrator which makes things so much easier for us.

 

[goofy4wdw2]

Thank you for your response! For travel do you have the small/portable concentrator that you can carry like a backpack? Did you have to purchase that or do you just borrow/rent it when traveling?

 

[just drea]

Hi...we are doing a DCL trip with my DH needing oxygen. Those other comments here are right, the doc needs to fillout form. We are flying and Disney helped with determining the air carrier, and we have their instructions. There is a vendor called Oxygen to go....they were VERY helpful to us. If you need that info...please PM me here. I hope you are able to get things planned, IMHO Disney goes beyond usual to have everyone be able to have their dream realized!!

 

[jmartinez1895]

We use a small portable device when traveling that our local medical supplier rents to us on a temp basis. Our doctor did have to wite an RX for it and fill out a simple form for the airline. We always fly southwest and you can print the form off the web site and they also have specifics on what brands you can use while in he air. I would assume that the other major air lines would have the same info of the web.

 

[SueM in MN]

((Hugs))

I am sorry for the reason for your trip and hope You are able to make the trip.

There have been previous threads where people were doing planning for taking a terminally ill family member to Disney World. In one particular case, I know they were not able to make the trip. But they posted that the planning and preparation became a wonderful bonding experience and a lot of good memories for them.

Besides the information that people have already posted, I want to point you toward post 30 on page 2 of the disABILITIES FAQs thread. You can find that thread near the top of this board or follow the link in my signature to get there.
That post includes a lot of information about travel with oxygen and what sorts of experiences you may have at Disney World.

Again, I hope you are able to make the trip and end up with a lot of wonderful memories. But even if you are not I hope the planning is comforting to you.