anyone using Masimo pulse ox's?

[velardern]

I'm trying to find out if anyone else is having alarm issues or o2 sats not correlating with arterial sats. All the research I can find on Masimo has to do with pedi/nicu's and I'm hearing that even though a sat may read 97% for example, it's erroneous and sats are actually lower.

[caliotter3]

Using one of these in a home care setting and have been informed by the family that there have been issues. They had one unit replaced. Now I will wonder about it.

[velardern]

Caliotter, do you know what kind of issues the family had? I had the opportunity to see an "independent" video study today of a patient being inducted for anesthesia with both a nellcor and a masimo pulse ox on. Sat's dropped on the nellcor, but remained normal on the Masimo. Now, I can't tell you if this is fact was a true study because I was not there and this was only 1 patient. A true study obviously needs a much larger sample size. Right now we're using Masimo, but switching back to nellcor because our icu's having been having alarm problems with Masimo. I can't tell you specifics simply because I'm new to my position and staff have not been able to give me specifics as to what's going on, they just know they're having problems. I'm happy to support what staff needs/wants to work effectively, but I also have to have patient safety as the top priority.

We need a product evaluation forum on this website )

[caliotter3]

Caliotter, do you know what kind of issues the family had? I had the opportunity to see an "independent" video study today of a patient being inducted for anesthesia with both a nellcor and a masimo pulse ox on. Sat's dropped on the nellcor, but remained normal on the Masimo. Now, I can't tell you if this is fact was a true study because I was not there and this was only 1 patient. A true study obviously needs a much larger sample size. Right now we're using Masimo, but switching back to nellcor because our icu's having been having alarm problems with Masimo. I can't tell you specifics simply because I'm new to my position and staff have not been able to give me specifics as to what's going on, they just know they're having problems. I'm happy to support what staff needs/wants to work effectively, but I also have to have patient safety as the top priority.

We need a product evaluation forum on this website )

I will ask the next time I see them. I think it had to do with the sensor not communicating with the unit, so no reading. The unit they have now appears to be working, but who knows? The alarms seem to be appropriate to me. I have to agree that I never saw problems with the Nellcor brand.

[sunnycalifRN]

I know this thread is a little old but, my two cents. We use Masimo and as with any piece of equipment, it can give erroneous data, so you've got to do your double checks. Of course, look at the patient, nice and pink, not tachypneic or tachycardic? HR correlates, good waveform, got 3 stars "***"? I've seen times when the finger probe was lying on the bed and the SpO2 was still reading 90% . . . but there was no waveform.

We use the ear probes for those patients who are shutting down peripheral circulation. Also the transcutaneous forehead probes work well for these same patients.