It infers saturation from two wavelengths of light, and the dissociation curve is flat at the top — so a patient on far too much oxygen reads the same as one on exactly enough.
Filed under MethodConstellation Oxygen & breathingStatus Upcoming
Not yet investigated
What we have so far
It infers saturation from two wavelengths of light, and the dissociation curve is flat at the top — so a patient on far too much oxygen reads the same as one on exactly enough.
This star is on the map because the show intends to take the question apart properly — the trials, how it is actually tested, whether the thing sold is the thing studied. That work is not done yet, and nothing here should be read as a conclusion. When the investigation is published it will appear on this page.
What we are reading
Gathered for the investigation and not yet written up. Each note says what the paper does and does not show.
Sjoding MW, Dickson RP, Iwashyna TJ, Gay SE, Valley TS. Racial bias in pulse oximetry measurement.N Engl J Med · 2020 · 383(25):2477–247810.1056/NEJMc2029240 · PMID 33326721
A research letter, not a full paper — worth saying when it is cited, because it changed practice at that weight. Occult hypoxaemia roughly three times more common in Black patients.
