Man Suffers Brain Damage Due to Oxygen Starvation While on Ventilator

I have been an educator since 1994, and have taught respiratory care for 11 years, and managed my hospital’s respiratory care area as an Associate Director of the Respiratory Care Department at a major university hospital for 8 years. Patients on mechanical ventilation should be on electronic monitoring of oxygen saturation, respiratory and heart rate, and temperature and blood pressure. Respiratory therapists must also be involved in routine ventilator checks, which would include: review of all monitored patient parameters (vital signs, oxygen saturation); patient assessment (listening to lung and heart sounds, chest movement, secretions, color); a complete check of all ventilator settings, alarms, and ventilator monitored parameters; plus any humidification or medication therapy. Many of the cases involved patient monitoring issues stemming from setup and monitoring of a transport ventilator, weaning from mechanical ventilation, failure to notice signs of respiratory failure.