Here is a bone to chew.
CLinically, a Pediatric or Neonate facility with multiple Category 1 spaces will have a larger demand for medical compressed air than for oxygen. This is due to the reality that studies have shown oxygen greater than a certain oxygen content percentage will cause blindness in children under the age of 5 years old who needed oxygen at birth and for a time in NICU.
Statement about the undersizing of the medical air makes sense.
As for High Frequency Ventilation (HFV):
The use of High Frequency ventilation in newborns (Neonates) is rare and used to be restricted to Teaching Medical Centers (i.e., Stanford, Johns Hopkins, etc.).
My information regarding this information is dated and the use of these machines may have become more wide spread throughout the USA.
The High Frequency Ventilation (HFV) can range in breaths per minute of hundreds to 1000 plus breaths per minute of extremely small volumes equaling a regular minute volume of 20 - 50 breaths per minute by conventional ventilator.
The HFV came about in the late 1980s to address the reduction of barotrauma seen in premie babies who survived the NICU experience.
These ventilators became attractive for newborns to reduce the presence of high pressures in the chest typical of mechanical ventilation. Hence the extremely small volumes at this high frequency presented a flow of gas in the chest resembling Brownian movement resulting a child with less barotrauma to their chest.
COrrect me if I am wrong but, my assumption is:
Since the origin of HFV is to reduce mechanical trauma at the same minute ventilation these ventilators do not always equate to higher percentage of oxygen or demand on the oxygen flow capacity of the piping system.
Once you'all are done yawning you realize i do love this stuff!
I look forward to reading your thoughts to this subject.
