Craziest vitals on a person who lived?

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What's the craziest vitals you've seen on someone who lived?

I've not seen too many extreme situations, but the ones which stand out for me are:

BP - 60/35 - postpartum hemorrhage, recovered with blood transfusions

SPO2 - 40% - young MVA. Turned a really interesting shade of blue-purple. Patient stabilized and continued to live, comatose, but my shift ended then, so I'm not sure if he ever recovered.

HR - 38 - Michael Phelps at rest! But seriously, what's the lowest you've seen in a *normal* person? ;)

RR - 40-60, continuous, despite numerous respiratory interventions. Patient unconscious and remained alive through my shift to the surprise of everyone.

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Specializes in SICU, trauma, neuro.

I've had a BP 60/35, after getting an epidural. My poor husband had briefly left the building, and he came back to find me flat on my back with a non-rebreather and my RN squeezing an NS bolus into me. He's like, "what's going on, is she okay??" And I'm weakly, "I'm fine...BP just a bit low..."

My very first day in my ICU--didactic day, actually, a guy w/ a GSW to the head spiked a temp of 43° C!!!!!! Neurogenic fever. They got him on the Alsius and he pulled through. QOL not great, though

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Specializes in PDN; Burn; Phone triage.

We had a lady who was septic. Her bp was 60-70s/40s (art line, manual confirmation) -- TOTALLY asymptomatic. Her bp would drop lower when she slept and we would go back and forth over whether to start a pressor not. She really was totally asymptomatic. We discharged her eventually and her systolic never got above 100.

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I see systolic BPs in the 60s fairly frequently...that doesn't stress me out too much at this point. This might not actually be a vital sign, but the worst I've seen on a patient that lived was a CI of 0.9 (fresh heart). And it was suddenly, out of nowhere...exciting night, to say the least.

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Had a patient who heart rate would go into the low thirties when lying flat.

It was very scary repositioning him.

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Specializes in Peds/Neo CCT,Flight, ER, Hem/Onc.

SaO2 of 6%!!! Yes it was accurate. Baby had an ABG that correlated and she was not a congenital heart. It was a horrible transport.

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Specializes in ICU, LTACH, Internal Medicine.

My "working" BP is around 90-100/60, so there were a few cases I had it 50/30 when I had anaphylaxis and still was there and even talking some sense:yes:. I even had to put in my "allergy card" and medi-alert a plea not to push it above 120/80 because I feel like crap when it comes above 130 systolic.

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my blood sugar was 33 once when I was pregnant and hadn't eaten in a few hours and my BP went from 202/110 to 65/30 when I got a spinal...I nearly threw up laying flat!

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I'll go with pulse, rr, bp all zero.

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Specializes in Emergency.
I'll go with pulse, rr, bp all zero.

Yep, successful resuscitations seem to have 0, 0/0, 0 charted somewhere.

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HR - 38 - Michael Phelps at rest!.

I'm a competitive cyclist, and have seen low 40s on myself when resting quietly with a tele monitor on (I was letting a new grad practice putting the leads on me). I have an ID bracelet that I wear when I bike, and I have "Low Pulse Rate" on there just to warn people in case something happens and they think it's unusually low! On the flip side, I have done short, fast races with an average heartrate of 185-195bpm! I find that far scarier :)

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I had a lady whose systolic was 50-60 and could only be heard by Doppler, so I couldn't tell you a diastolic. She was totally asymptomatic for weeks with that BP!

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