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Cutaneous Monitoring of Systemic P co2 on Patients in the Respiratory Intensive Care Unit being Weaned from the Ventilator
Author(s) -
Eletr S.,
Jimison H.,
Ream A. K.,
Dolan W. M.,
Rosenthal M. H.
Publication year - 1978
Publication title -
acta anaesthesiologica scandinavica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.738
H-Index - 107
eISSN - 1399-6576
pISSN - 0001-5172
DOI - 10.1111/j.1399-6576.1978.tb01406.x
Subject(s) - medicine , pco2 , intensive care unit , stratum corneum , arterial blood , radial artery , anesthesia , respiratory system , forearm , artery , intensive care , respiratory rate , biomedical engineering , surgery , blood pressure , heart rate , pathology , intensive care medicine
A procedure for measuring the partial pressure of CO 2 in equilibrium with the epidermis was developed at Hewlett‐Packard Laboratories. It consists of determining by infra‐red absorption techniques the concentration of CO 2 inside a small (50 μl) chamber applied hermetically over and around an epidermal window (2.25 cm 2 ) stripped of its stratum corneum or horny layer. We have applied the procedure to 25 patients in the Respiratory Intensive Care Unit at Stanford Hospital. Only patients scheduled for weaning from the ventilator were selected for the study. The epidermal windows were on the medial aspect of the forearm and were monitored for 3–6 h. Arterial blood samples were periodically withdrawn from the catheterized radial artery and were analysed by conventional means for subsequent comparison with the cutaneous measurements which were recorded in real time at the rate of one a minute. The range of arterial P co2 values that were measured varied from 3.33 to 9.30 kPa (25 to 70 mmHg) and correlated well with the corresponding cutaneous P co2 values that were typically higher than the arterial values by 0.7 kPa (5.2 mmHg) with a standard deviation of 0.2 kPa (1.5 mmHg). Some typical recordings of cutaneous P co2 are shown and discussed.