What are Oxygen Monitors?

Oxygen monitors are basically devices that detect, measure or monitor oxygen levels in air or gas for safety or industrial purposes. As safety devices, it becomes an oxygen deficiency monitor that can be a room fixture or handy portable device that you can take with you to potentially hazardous locations. Applications of these devices are vast and can be found in the chemical, manufacturing, oil, telecommunications industries or any other fields that can involve employees getting exposed to hazardous materials and gases.

They can also be used for general purposes as in homes or in hospitals. They come in different models of hospital and home oxygen monitors. One good application of these devices in the hospital setting is for monitoring oxygen levels inside the MRI examination room.

Versus Oxygen Saturation Monitors

It has to be clarified that the oxygen monitor products defined above are totally different from health safety devices known as the oxygen saturation detector or monitor. The former being machines that measure air air quality or oxygen composition while the latter being devices that measure oxygen levels in the blood stream. Also called pulse oximeters, blood oximeters, etc., they measure oxygen saturation in the blood stream during anesthetic operations or for any other hospital conditions. They also have portable versions for home use.

Versus Natural Gas Detectors

Natural gas detectors are safety devices that measure natural gas in the air. It basically works the same way as oxygen monitors but they serve different purposes. Homes that are hooked up to natural gas lines for their energy are subjected to fire hazard risks due to gas leakage and hence, gas detectors are usually installed to mitigate this risk.

The above air quality and safety devices were developed for different purposes and knowing the basic difference between them can help clear some of the confusion for first time buyers.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 12th, 2010 at 4:24 am and is filed under Applications of Oxygen Monitors, Oxygen Monitors Buying Guide. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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