How to Measure and Record Vital Signs During First Aid

Step-by-Step Guide

1. 1

   Step 1: Ask if the patient ate or drank something hot or cold

   If the patient has done any of these things, wait to take the temperature for 10 minutes.
2. 2

   Step 2: smoked

   Place the thermometer under the tongue to take an oral temperature only if the patient is at least 5 years old, conscious, lucid, able to breathe through the nose, and doesn't have a facial injury that would make it difficult to hold the thermometer under the tongue.
   
   Use a digital thermometer, not a glass thermometer.
   
   If the glass breaks, your or the patient may be cut, and if the thermometer contains mercury you or the patient may come in contact with it.
   
   Mercury is toxic.
   
   Use a thermometer strip on the forehead or put the thermometer under the patient's arm (axillary temperature) if you can't take an oral temperature.
   
   Thermometer strips and axillary temperatures are less accurate than other methods of taking a temperature. , If you use a temperature strip, wait for the time specified in the instructions. , Normal temperature is somewhere around 98 degrees Fahrenheit (37 Celsius).
3. 3

   Step 3: chewed gum or did any strenuous activity within the last 10 minutes.

4. 4

   Step 4: Take the patient's temperature.

5. 5

   Step 5: Wait until the digital thermometer beeps to read the display.

6. 6

   Step 6: Write down the patient's temperature

7. 7

   Step 7: where on the body it was taken

8. 8

   Step 8: and the time.

Detailed Guide

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