Datascope versus Mercury

Which machine do you prefer a BP is given with?

[caroladybelle, BSN, RN]

A human being with good ears and a stethoscope, and the common sense to use them.

[VickyRN, MSN, DNP, RN]

BTW, mercury is being eliminated from medical equipment... so you won't see the old fashioned mercury sphygmomanometers anymore. As for which I prefer--a machine versus human being-- the datascope is programed by a human being and calibrated according to readings on a manual blood pressure cuff. So, obviously, I prefer the "old-fashioned" manual blood pressure cuff, not the datascope. I wonder if any research has been done to corroborate which is more accurate?

[live4today, RN]

Originally posted by caroladybelle

A human being with good ears and a stethoscope, and the common sense to use them.

You go nursey nurse! My thoughts exactly! :)

[Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN]

Originally posted by VickyRN

BTW, mercury is being eliminated from medical equipment... so you won't see the old fashioned mercury sphygmomanometers anymore. As for which I prefer--a machine versus human being-- the datascope is programed by a human being and calibrated according to readings on a manual blood pressure cuff. So, obviously, I prefer the "old-fashioned" manual blood pressure cuff, not the datascope. I wonder if any research has been done to corroborate which is more accurate?

Our own floor's research has been that the mercury ones are more accurate. Since March I've run across 3 pt.'s that the datascope couldn't even read, yet use the mercury one in the room did just fine.

[caroladybelle, BSN, RN]

My problem with dynamaps (mechanicals), is they are misused.

They really should be used for patients on frequent vitals and that are reasonably stable, not dragged room to room to multiple patients.

They are notoriously inaccurate on patients with cardiac arrhythmias. And I personally get tired of, "I can't get a BP" from nurse externs, and finding that they never try to get a manual BP.

Does anyone wonder about infection control and dragging this machine from room to room? I am always amazed at nurses that glove up and wash their hands within an inch of their lives, yet think nothing of going from a HepB-C shingles patient to an immunosuppressed one, with the same dynamap with the same cuff.

Either that or the individual that has to do one, maybe two sets of vitals and search the length of the unit for an hour for a dynamap.