pacnw
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Post by pacnw on Jul 29, 2024 22:13:49 GMT
In all the years I have been a Biomed I still have yet to see a machine that I could not get to calibrate properly where I had to change the volume of the balance chamber to get it to come in. Most of the time I get to a machine, the previous person working on them machine, had to lower the volume of the chamber to get it to calibrate.... i change it back to what was written on the chamber and reset the system.... Again not once did I have a machine that I could not calibrate normally.... This does not mean that maybe one day I will! I guess I would do just like you have and validate everything like you have and last case adjust your balance chamber after all is ruled out... It will happen some day to me too... But for now I follow the steps to calibrate and come out good in the end.... Good luck on this one!!
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pacnw
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Posts: 203
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Post by pacnw on Aug 1, 2024 17:43:39 GMT
I've been thinking about the above comment.... I have changed the balance chamber volume on a couple machines. Written on the balance chamber was 61.8ish as the volume of the chamber, which is higher than normal.... I did change that volume to a lower amount after weighing the volume and seeing that the volume was actually 60.4 ish. When I use the scale to validate the number I usually do this step 4-5 times so I have an average because of the "Dribble". They always sit prety close(usually within .1 of the last test)... I didn't change it because the condo was out of whack (that I knew of) but rather because the volume written on the chamber was abnormal.... I'm not opposed to changing the volume at all but it's not something I've had to do to get condo inline....
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Post by yellow2green on Aug 1, 2024 20:26:25 GMT
In all the years I have been a Biomed I still have yet to see a machine that I could not get to calibrate properly where I had to change the volume of the balance chamber to get it to come in. Most of the time I get to a machine, the previous person working on them machine, had to lower the volume of the chamber to get it to calibrate.... i change it back to what was written on the chamber and reset the system.... Again not once did I have a machine that I could not calibrate normally.... This does not mean that maybe one day I will! I guess I would do just like you have and validate everything like you have and last case adjust your balance chamber after all is ruled out... It will happen some day to me too... But for now I follow the steps to calibrate and come out good in the end.... Good luck on this one!! .... Again not once did I have a machine that I could not calibrate normally.... So you are telling me that every time you calibrate both Concentrate pumps and you only put what it pulls from the buret in the yellow box and it comes in to conductivity = TCD everytime? And from the following post. BCV was set to 618ish and was actually 604ish and you didn't have any conductivity issues? Your limits are locked right? Both of these scenarios are just killing my brain. I wonder if FMC found a better way to calibrate these and started validating them more accurately. How old are your machines? I had 28 from 2012, 13 and 14 and all of them need the pumps over/under stepped to get 13.5, I just received some 2017's and that's where i saw the 621. I get it, were all human. But that's why we want to know for certain that BCV is right and adjust accordingly. Remember is 13.5 required? No. But it is ALWAYS the goal.
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pacnw
Full Member
Posts: 203
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Post by pacnw on Aug 2, 2024 15:20:09 GMT
In all the years I have been a Biomed I still have yet to see a machine that I could not get to calibrate properly where I had to change the volume of the balance chamber to get it to come in. Most of the time I get to a machine, the previous person working on them machine, had to lower the volume of the chamber to get it to calibrate.... i change it back to what was written on the chamber and reset the system.... Again not once did I have a machine that I could not calibrate normally.... This does not mean that maybe one day I will! I guess I would do just like you have and validate everything like you have and last case adjust your balance chamber after all is ruled out... It will happen some day to me too... But for now I follow the steps to calibrate and come out good in the end.... Good luck on this one!! .... Again not once did I have a machine that I could not calibrate normally.... So you are telling me that every time you calibrate both Concentrate pumps and you only put what it pulls from the buret in the yellow box and it comes in to conductivity = TCD everytime? And from the following post. BCV was set to 618ish and was actually 604ish and you didn't have any conductivity issues? Your limits are locked right? Both of these scenarios are just killing my brain. I wonder if FMC found a better way to calibrate these and started validating them more accurately. How old are your machines? I had 28 from 2012, 13 and 14 and all of them need the pumps over/under stepped to get 13.5, I just received some 2017's and that's where i saw the 621. I get it, were all human. But that's why we want to know for certain that BCV is right and adjust accordingly. Remember is 13.5 required? No. But it is ALWAYS the goal. ok so lets confirm one thing on this. When you validate acid and bicarb as per the PM you verify AMIN and AMAX to 20 strokes of the acid pump. The same for bicarb. The PM is not the the amount of volume pulled on the acid pump. You set your acid pump up so that it pulls the measure of AMIN (lower limit) to AMAX(upper limit). if you are between those numbers you are within spec. So with that said When I set my acid volume by testing the amount of volume pulled from the pump I usually add 0.1 to the amount pulled. Again this is not the PM as so many people think. The PM is to validate the amount pulled and making sure you are within AMIN and AMAX for Acid and BMIN and BMAX for bicarb. So by adding to the amount drawn is ok as long as you are between the numbers. I usually set mine on the mid to lower level of the limit. So lets go a little further on this..... When you complete your pump volumes and type in the amount drawn have you ever checked it again after your value has been added?? Is it ever correct?? Did the machine accept the volume you typed in? Probably not! Again that is why the PM is to VALIDATE AMIN AND AMAX and BMIN AND BMAX and not just type in your pump volumes and call it good. Is this "fudging Numbers"? NO it is not because you are validating it by overall volume.
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Post by bsquared on Aug 9, 2024 12:33:47 GMT
NOW, we are getting somewhere. I'm the type that if you "forbid" me to do anything I'm going to want to know why. If you really want to experiment and have actual lab results, pick a machine to make an adjustment to, then pull a dialysate sample and have a full test run on it. When I "fixed" that one a couple of years ago that's what I ended up doing so that I could sleep at night. It came back perfect, even the EBV was right on the prescribed 33. This is just my own personal experience and would still be just a theory had it not been confirmed by my instructor. Lol, when our class inevitably made it around to the balancing chamber calibration discussion I added what I stated in my earlier posts about it adjusting the AAcd and ABic steps and his eyes got really big as he pointed at me, then he started shaking his head up and down fiercely, looking at the rest of the class as if I had just split the atom, and asked if everyone heard what I said. It was after that when he stated "it is the LAST RESORT" to dialing in your conductivity. This is good stuff and I agree with "it is the LAST RESORT" to dialing in your conductivity." I too have sent out profiles to validate my findings and they were spot on.
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Post by robertb on Aug 24, 2024 1:39:26 GMT
in the end what does the manual say.. does it say it's okay to adjust bc volume to make your conductivity within range I don't think so.. I've heard many internet theories all you have do is complete 3 balance chamber volume calibrations and averaged them out I could not find that in the manual though so I'll stick to what the manual says Never adjust balance chamber volume
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