EKG Machines Available As Used Medical Equipment January 20th, 2008

    With more and more concern about the rising costs of health care, every means possible to cut expenses becomes important. One way doctor’s offices and clinics and hospitals save is with the purchase of used medical equipment, usually refurbished equipment. But since any medical device being resold must be labeled as “used” these devices may be brand new surplus.

    An example of the reason for going the used route is in the example of a GE ECG Machine that normally sells for more than $5,000 USD being offered from an online dealer for about $2.499, or half price! And that was for a machine that had never been used under full warranty. Most refurbished equipment will also have a warranty close to that of a new model. GE ECG Machine

    EKG Machines, also called ECG machines, are one of the most basic medical devices in use and nearly every office setting has at least one. The EKG/ECG dual names come from the original German form of the word which had the “K” and the English spelling that uses a ‘C” instead, but both terms mean the same device.

    It was in 1600 that the term “electricity” began to be used for the currents it describes, but it was not until 1893 that the Dutch researcher Willem Einthoven used the term electrocardiogram and two years later named the up and down motions or deflections from the heart’s electrical impulses the familiar P, Q, R, S, and T. (The U wave was described much later and is not typical.) In 1901 he managed to design a galvanometer which could detect these impulse, the first working EKG. He received the Nobel Prize for this invention in 1924.

    Modern EKG machines are quite different from the early models, being electronic and usually fully automatic. Some even give preliminary interpretations although a full reading by a cardiologist is almost always done in practice. The first machines used six chest leads and four limb leads to the electrodes applied to the chest to pick up tiny currents and then to record them on a graph paper.

    Now EKG machines are able to get accurate recording with far fewer leads and can even be wireless so that patients can be mobile and monitored via telemetry. Old machines had to be set to every section of an EKG reading but now will generate all twelve leads automatically and most can be set to interpret or not.

    EKG machines are such essential office medical equipment that finding the best price for quality equipment makes a great deal of sense. Using reputable online and physical used and refurbished equipment vendors can help to reduce medical care costs for everyone.


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