What is the thing that they put on your finger at hospitals? It has a red light on it.?

Question

My girlfriend went to the hospital today and they put one of these on her finger. We cant seem to figure out why?

Answer 1

paramedic girl is right, its called a pulsox, but it does more than pulse, it measures the oxygen content of the blood, thus the need for the red light, which bounces off the blood cells of the same color and can measure oxygen saturation in the blood.

Answer 2

It's called a Pulse-Oximeter. It actually is shining two lights through the finger- one visible red, the other infra-red. The device is comparing the ration absorption v.s. transmission of each light-source. To be considered an accurate reading the patients pulse must be within 2 beats of that displayed on the machine. Many things can cause false readings-

- Nail polish, especialy blue-greens

- Cold

- Carbon Monoxide poisoning

- Methemoglobinemia

- Anemia

- Blood loss (trauma)

Also the Oximeter only measures the percent of red blood cells that are transporting oxygen in a normal patient, not how much oxygen is being transported or if it's being off-loaded at the cells. For example if a trauma patient is "satting" at 98% most people would assume that they patient is doing well, but may fail to realise that the patient is actually in distress since they are missing 25% of their blood volume, so that 98% is more like 75% of normal.

For more see-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_oxime...

http://www.oximetry.org/pulseox/principl...

- David

Answer 3

It's a pulse ox.

It gives a semi accurate pulse count. Doing it by 2 fingers as well is important. The two should be compared.

Also bad circulation, and false nails do not give an accurate account of the pulse.

Answer 4

it measures your pulse

Answer 5

pulse