Either you know what ununquadium is, or you don’t.

Either way, it’s probably why you clicked.

Ununquadium is one of the superheavy synthetic elements (the ones we make in a reactor). There are several interesting things we’ve learned about it that everyone should know:

For example, we know that it might be a solid… or it might not.

We know that it might be a gas… or it might not.

We know that it might be a semiconductor, or it might not! Also most superheavy elements fly apart before you can blink, but ununquadium lasts all of 1.9 seconds!

(At this point, I know you’re reading just to see how I’m going to segue from ununquadium to ECMO. [Keep reading, you’ll be amazed or your money back {since you didn’t pay anything!}])

Also we know that ununquadium is no longer called ununquadium. It’s now called flerovium, after the first people who cooked it up in a Russian reactor.

They name the atoms, but I name the blogs.

(I know you’re dying to hear about ECMO, hang on, I’m getting there.)

Ununquadium is element number 114. “One” in Latin is “un,” and “Four in Latin is “quad.”  

So the name of element “114” is literally “one-one-four:” un-un-quad-ium. If that’s not a truly disturbing failure of imagination, I don’t know what is.

Few have heard of ununquadium, but it’s intriguing. You know what that reminds me of? Our ELSA meter for ECMO. I’m sure you were thinking the same thing!

ECMO leaves too many hanging questions. For example:

There could be a clot in the oxygenator… or not.

There could be recirculation… or not!

ELSA offers amazing features (like OXBV trending) that allow you to foresee oxygenator changes so that each change can be made exactly when it is needed, not too soon and not too late, saving money, time, and preventing your patient from being exposed to the physiologic stress of an unnecessary change.

That’s just like ununquadium! Wait, no… it’s really not at all…

But ELSA also offers recirculation measurements, making it easy to know that your patient is receiving the oxygenation they desperately need.

So ELSA can help you guard your ECMO patients. Ununquadium probably can’t.

But they’re both pretty darned interesting. Click here for a quick glimpse of how essential the ELSA really is. All jesting aside, you just might save a life.

Thanks for reading,

               Transonic Systems, Inc

                              The Measure of Better Results