7-5 
The Sat-Seconds feature is available with the Nellcor SpO
2
 module to decrease the 
likelihood of false alarms caused by motion artifacts. To set the Sat-Seconds limit, select 
[Sat-Seconds] in the [SpO
2
 Setup] menu and then select the appropriate setting. 
 
With Sat-Seconds alarm management, high and low alarm limits are set in the same way 
as traditional alarm management. A Sat-Seconds limit is also set. The Sat-Seconds limit 
controls the amount of time that SpO
2
 saturation may be outside the set limits before an 
alarm sounds. The method of calculation is as follows: the number of percentage points 
that the SpO
2
 saturation falls outside the alarm limit is multiplied by the number of 
seconds that it remains outside the limit. This can be stated as the equation: 
 
Sat-Seconds= Points × Seconds 
 
Only when the Sat-Seconds limit is reached, the monitor gives a Sat-Seconds alarm. For 
example, the figure below demonstrates the alarm response time with a Sat-Seconds limit 
set at 50 and a low SpO
2
 limit set at 90%. In this example, the patient % SpO
2 
drops to 88% 
(2 points) and remains there for 2 seconds. Then it drops to 86% (4 points) for 3 seconds, 
and then to 84% (6 points) for 6 seconds. The resulting Sat-Seconds are: 
 
% SpO
2
Seconds Sat-Seconds
2× 2= 4 
4× 3= 12 
6× 
6= 
36 
otal Sat-Seconds= 52
 
 
 
 
After approximately 10.9 seconds, a Sat-Second alarm would sound, because the limit of 
50 Sat-Seconds would have been exceeded. 
 
SpO
2
%
Seconds