Blood Pressure Monitor and Cast Do You Know?

# There are lots of things all around us

# Exciting things that surround us

-# But how does it work?

-Do you know?

-# How is it made?

-Do you know?

# Things that go up Things that go down

# Things that go pop! Things that go around

# With special cameras to show you inside

# It's going to be a big surprise

-# But how does it work?

-Do you know?

-# How is it made?

-Do you know?

# Do you know? #

Let's find out!

Hello, I'm Maddie, and today I'm visiting a hospital.

Have you ever been to a hospital?

They're very special places

because inside there are lots of doctors and nurses

who help people get better if they're poorly or hurt.

Sometimes doctors use special machines to help people,

and there's one machine you might've seen before.

Let's go inside and have a look.

We're in a consulting room where you see a doctor,

and this is the machine.

It's called a blood pressure monitor.

Your heart pumps blood all around your body -

to your head, to your fingers and toes -

and doctors and nurses use blood pressure monitors

to check that your blood is flowing nicely through your body.

It's called checking your blood pressure.

But do you know how a blood pressure monitor works?

Let's find out.

How does it work?

A blood pressure monitor.

This is Amanda and she's going to check my blood pressure.

Blood pressure shows how easily blood passes through blood vessels,

and to measure it, she's going to use the blood pressure monitor.

The first thing that Amanda is doing, she's putting this bit -

it's called the cuff - around the top of my arm.

Now Amanda is pressing a button

which makes air travel from the machine

through this tube and into the cuff.

The cuff is blowing up.

It's like blowing up armbands when you go to the swimming pool.

BUZZING

Did you hear that sound?

That buzzing sound was the machine working and inflating the cuff.

BUZZING I can feel the cuff

getting tighter and tighter.

It's a bit like having your arm squeezed, but it doesn't hurt.

When it's ready, we'll hear a little beep

and that will tell Amanda it's ready so she can check my blood pressure.

BEEPING And that was the beeping sound.

If you look at the monitor, you can see two numbers,

and those numbers will tell Amanda if my blood pressure is OK.

-Amanda, how's my blood pressure?

-It's fine today, Maddie.

-Thank you.

So, my blood pressure is nice and healthy.

But how does the cuff tightening around my arm tell the machine

and Amanda that my blood pressure is OK?

To find out, we need to see what's going on inside my body

when my blood pressure is being taken.

Your heart pumps blood all around your body.

With each heartbeat, it pumps blood

through lots of little tubes called blood vessels.

Having good blood pressure

means your blood is flowing nice and easily around your body.

It's not going too fast or too slow.

When your blood pressure is checked,

the cuff on the monitor fills with air

and it gets bigger and bigger.

The bigger it grows, the tighter it gets.

This squeezes the blood vessels

so the machine can measure how easily blood travels through.

The doctor can tell your blood pressure by the numbers shown.

If you've ever had your blood pressure taken,

then you know it feels funny as it tightens on your arm,

but it doesn't hurt.

But do you know what blood vessels look like?

Well, I don't have a special camera with me today.

Instead I have a very special light,

and it shows you what's happening under your skin.

But first we need to dim the lights and turn it on.

BEEPING

Wow! That's amazing!

It looks like there are lots of branches of trees inside my arms,

or the veins that you see on a leaf,

but what you're actually seeing are my blood vessels.

This special light uses a laser to show you your blood vessels

under your skin, and there are so many in my arm.

Look at my hand. My hand is full of blood vessels.

I can follow these blood vessels and veins from my hand

all the way up my arm, even to my elbow.

Can you see those dark patches?

That's the blood flowing freely around my body.

That is incredible.

How amazing to be able to see under your skin using a special light.

I loved being able to see under my skin

and learning how a blood pressure monitor works.

What was your favourite bit?

Do you remember what you call

the part of the blood pressure monitor which goes around your arm?

That's right. It's called the cuff.

Did you hear this sound when the cuff was blowing up

with air like a balloon?

BUZZING

And did you see the blood vessels in my arm

when I used my special light?

Wow. That's amazing!

It looks like there are lots of branches of trees inside my arms,

or the veins that you see on a leaf.

If you ever need to have your blood pressure checked

or see someone else checked, you'll know how the monitor works,

and what your veins look like inside your body.

There are lots of reasons why people might come to a hospital,

and one of them is if they break a bone.

I broke my arm when I was younger.

Have you ever broken an arm? Or a leg? Or a finger?

Whatever you break,

there are special doctors and nurses in hospitals

who help fix broken bones,

and there's something they use to put on a broken bone

to help fix it.

Can you guess what it is?

That's right. It's a cast.

This is a cast for an arm, but do you know how it's made?

Let's find out.

How is it made?

A cast.

When a bone is broken,

a special photograph is taken called an X-ray

and it shows the doctor what the bone looks like inside a body.

An X-ray looks like this.

This is an X-ray of an arm.

And can you see that the bone here is broken?

To fix it, the bone needs to be held still for a few weeks

so it can be made straight again.

And here after it's been put in a cast,

you can see that the bone is now straight and it's healed.

But I want to see how a cast is made, so I've come here.

This is the plaster room where plaster is put on broken bones

to help them get better.

You can get different types of cast -

a plaster cast, which is made from bandages

covered in a special type of clay,

or fibreglass, which is a special bandage

made from woven glass strands.

This is Sean and he's going

to be putting a fibreglass cast on my arm.

Now, I haven't broken my arm, but we've been given special permission

for Sean to put a cast on me so we can show you how it's made.

First, Sean is putting a nice, soft layer around my arm,

and it looks like a big long sock.

There's even a little sock for my thumb.

Next, Sean is wrapping my arm in padding.

This will make the bandage really comfortable.

It's lovely and soft.

Now it's time for the bandage,

and there are lots of colours to choose from.

I've gone with blue.

First, Sean has dipped the bandage in water,

and that's made it easy to work with.

And it's sticky, so it sticks to itself

as it's being wrapped around my arm.

It does feel really warm.

It's a lovely, cosy, snugly feeling.

And the bandage sets really quickly.

That means it goes hard, and that's what will protect my bone

and help it to get better.

Oh, that's such a strange feeling.

Sean smoothes the cast out and then he's finished.

My arm feels really protected and safe.

I love the colour too.

You could have all sorts of colours - red, green.

How about pink? What's your favourite colour?

I think I'll stick with blue.

Now the bandage is on my arm,

we need to wait for it to dry and set so it goes hard.

Let's use my special camera to take a closer look.

This is a microscope,

and it lets us see really small things in close detail.

Wow.

Look at the bandage.

Can you see all the fibreglass strands

looping through the material of the bandage?

That is amazing. It looks like blue rope covered in glue, doesn't it?

What do you think it looks like?

This is going to set.

It'll become really hard and this will protect my arm.

That is brilliant. Time to see if my cast is set.

Listen to the sound when I tap it.

KNOCKING It sounds like knocking on a door.

KNOCKING Now the cast is dry and hard,

so if there was a broken bone inside here,

my arm would be kept still and safe so it could heal and get better.

But now it's dry, there's something really fun we can do to it.

We can draw on it with sparkles.

There we go. A sparkly heart.

You could have all sorts of pictures on a cast.

What picture would you like to draw?

Now, usually, it takes a couple of weeks

for a broken bone to get better, but luckily,

I don't have a broken arm,

so Sean is going to take the cast off for me.

Well, my cast is off and my arm is back to normal.

What was your favourite bit about seeing how a cast was made?

Do you remember what colour my cast was?

That's right, it was blue,

but you can get all sorts of colours.

Which colour would you choose?

Did you hear the sound the cast made

when I tapped it? KNOCKING

It sounded like knocking on a door. KNOCKING

And did you see what the fibreglass cast looked like

when I filmed it with my special camera?

It looks like blue rope covered in glue, doesn't it?

That is brilliant.

So, the next time you see someone with a fibreglass cast

or you have one, you'll know how they're made.

And now you know how a blood pressure monitor works

and how it helps doctors and nurses check

the blood is flowing nicely in your body.

I'll see you next time.

# There are lots of things all around us

# Exciting things that surround us

-# But how does it work?

-Do you know?

-# How is it made?

-Do you know?

# Do you know? #

Let's find out!