VFlutter
Flight Nurse
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Good to know. I wish I had a way to see this first hand to solidify the idea.
A down and dirty example...
You pick up a IFT patient that was intubated for respiratory failure. Their ABG is something like this.
pH 7.16
PC02 70
ETC02 65
You put them on the ventilator with appropriate settings and monitor their ETC02, by the time you get to the receiving facility their ETC02 is now 45. So you changed their ETC02 by 20 (which should equal a PC02 of 50). So for each 10 change in C02 the pH should change 0.08 in the opposite direction. So for this patient it should change by 0.16 (0.8x2) You drove the c02 down so the pH should go up. When they draw a blood gas the patients pH should be 7.32 (7.16+0.16). If you wanted the patient to have a perfect pH of 7.40 then you would have to decrease their c02 another 10. If that makes sense.