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Join us in celebrating National Biomedical/Clinical Engineering Appreciation Week

Join Biomedical Engineering in recognizing professionals who service medical technology during the week of May 18th - 24th. Stop by our table in the White Lobby on Tuesday, May 20th from 8:00 am to
4:30 pm to learn more about our department.

Using the Override Function of the Sigma Spectrum large volume infusion pump

The drug library is a safety feature of this pump. If you program a dose of medication that is outside the minimum and maximum ranges in the drug library, the pump asks you to verify the dosage. This is a reminder to step back and recheck the medication order, and how you are programming the pump. You can always verify the appropriate dose with another clinician (RN or pharmacist). If you do override the ranges, and begin the infusion, the pump has a second alert in a red stripe on the screen that reads dose rate HI or Low. Again, please use this alert to step back and recheck the medication order and pump programming. A new drug library will be uploaded to the pumps starting on March 1st.

2007 Biomedical Engineering Patient Safety Award Winners Announced

Congratulations to Ryan Forde, Clinical Engineer in the OR, who won the annual award at MGH for his "continuous attention to the solution of patient safety challenges". Ellen Kinnealey, RN, was recognized for "frequent innovation in providing solutions to unique safety problems". Congratulations, Ellen!

Question: Is there anything that can be done about the EKG artifact that we get from CVVH machines? We notice that even when we use the special CVVH outlets, we still get artifact on the monitor.

Answer: Artifact displayed on the physiological monitor is a problem not only with CVVH machines, but for any device that uses PVC tubing and a peristaltic pump such as a heart-lung machine, ECMO machine, etc. The monitor detects a small electrical signal from the patient that is produced by the effect of the pump on the PVC tubing. If all the electrodes do not have the same low impedance (with adequate skin contact), the monitor is unable to filter out the artifact and will display it as though it is the ECG.  For this reason, proper skin preparation when attaching electrodes is vital.  Even with excellent skin prep, there are some patients for whom it is very difficult to obtain good skin/electrode conduction. Click here to read an ECRI article that describes the problem in detail.

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This page was last updated on 5/15/2008