Arterial blood gases

I wonder if anyone could to help me i have just been discharged from hospital and trying to understand blood gases i had a p02 of 29 which i belive is high does anyone know what this means in terms of asthma .

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Erm thats confusing blood gases can be measured in 2 different kind of units some hosps do it in Kpa and the limits for PO2 are between 10-14 others do it in mmHg the limits for that being 75-105. Or do you mean your PCO2 which is to do with your carbon dioxide and would mean your levels were low if measured in mmHg.

Sorry if thats not much help but you can find the values for blood gases here.

tinyurl.com/yu8jdm

Clare

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hi there

Firstly dont worry as your blood gas

was perfectly fine.

The reason they do arterial gases is to check how well your lungs are moving oxygen. A normal value on air is above 10 for the Po2 thats what i was told last time i was on icu. Anything less than 10 shows you need the supplementary oxygen anything higher means they can start to turn the oxygen down or off. Too much oxygen is just as dangerous as too little therefore they do keep a close eye on your gases when your unwell!

When i was unwell this last time prior to them sorting my theophyline levels out i had a po2 of 6 once the magnesium and theophyline had kicked in and after several hours on icu i had a po2 of 20 so they were able to reduce my oxygen to 50% from 100%.

Using blood gases every few hours on the icu they were able to tweak with the oxygen levels and move me to the main ward again where they continued to sort me out and then last thurs i escaped.

I hope this puts your mind at rest. The oxygen levels you described were quite high it could just be that the meds they gave you had finally kicked in and helped relieve your asthma or they just had you on too high a level of oxygen for a bit.

This was the general gist of what i got from my last admission as im always a tad nosey with what they are doing to me! Im sure if im incorrect someone who knows more maybe a doc will correct me! Hope this puts your mind at rest. Take care and take it easy! Lotsa lv kk Xxx