MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
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My son had a bad asthma attack saturday. he had been unwell with a cold for a couple of days beforehand and it got to the point saturday afternoon where he couldn't talk. I took him to A&E and they were very concerned as his sats were only 80% and dropping. he needed 8 ltrs/min of O2 to get it back up to 95%, and spent two days in hospital with nebulisers every hour and finally started heading the right way yesterday afternoon. this is the 1st time he has been hospitalised because of asthma, and previously the we only had to up the qty of his salbutamol and he would be fine.
So I want an oximeter i can keep at home so the next time his asthma is bad I can monitor if his blood saturation is ok and if it starts to drop get him to A&E rather than it get to the point where he can barely breathe.
does anyone have one that they can recommend, or know where to get them?
http://www.clinicalguard.com/UK-pulse-oximeters-c-25.html or amazon. There is a scheme up here somewhere where COPD patients have been given Oximeters that have a live feed to the GP surgery who check the results and call you in if need be. Perhaps there is something similar where you are. You may also be able to get one on prescription.
thank obi, they are more resonable than i was expecting.
he will have a referral to the asthma clinic sometime in the next couple of weeks i'll ask them if there are any such schemes.
I think you will find that the use of pulse oximetry as a monitor to assess asthma is not really advised...
"A National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute/World Health Organization Global Asthma Initiative Report concluded that pulse oximetry was not an appropriate method of monitoring patients with asthma. The report explained that, during asthma exacerbations, the degree of hypoxemia may not accurately reflect the underlying degree of ventilation-perfusion (V-Q) mismatch."
The problem is that, particularly in young children who tend to be otherwise fit and well, oximetry can be misleading; they tend to saturate well despite having compromised air flow in the lungs, so a low oximeter reading tends to be a late sign that something is wrong.
I'd have a chat with your specialist asthma nurse and whichever respiratory consultant before buying; it may be that better peak flow readings or even a home nebuliser may be a better option.
Plus.....I suspect that using a pulse oximeter regularly might frighten him more than not, and asthma can sometimes become a ...psychological issue.... particularly in children..
IMHO Peak flow is probably the answer.
Home neb might only serve to delay seeking appropriate treatment.
Interestingly, SaO2 does feature in the BTS guidelines on acute severe asthma.
Andy