Hospitals are scary places at the best of times and when you see all the complicated equipment it is easy to let your imagination run riot. It can be even worse to see this equipment in a home where a loved one is seriously ill or prone to certain attacks. This is why it is important to try and keep the equipment as unobtrusive as possible such as the fingertip pulse oximeter.

What is pulse oximetry?

Pulse oximetry is a procedure used to measure the oxygen level (or oxygen saturation) in...

Seeing an operating theatre is a scary moment and this effect is intensified with the sound of all those machines such as the fingertip pulse oximeter, among others. A fingertip pulse oximeter can detect hypoxia before a patient shows signs of becoming cyanotic (bluish discoloration of the skin and mucous membranes due to not enough oxygen in the blood). For this reason, fingertip pulse oximeters may be used in all manner of situations but are of particular value for monitoring a patient...