An Evidence-Based Approach to Reduce Nuisance Alarms and Alarm Fatigue

Abstract

decisions about where to program alarm settings, Masimo Corp. based in Irvine, CA conducted an analysis of 32 million pulse oximetry (SpO 2 ) data points from 10 hospital general post-surgical care areas. Each hospital was equipped with a Masimo Patient SafetyNetTM remote monitoring and clinician notification system, which continuously captures and stores time-stamped SpO 2 data with a one-second resolution. This paper reports on the results of a retrospective analysis conducted by the company to determine the incidence of alarms at various alarm threshold and delay settings.