Uses of Common Industrial Gases in Hospitals

​Industrial gases are crucial in multiple sectors, including space exploration and health care. In fact, recent research shows that the US medical gas market reached a valuation of $3.9 billion in 2021 and is expected to expand. Commercial suppliers provide hospitals with a diverse range of gases for various purposes.

Medical oxygen, or oxygen USP, is another common gas in healthcare facilities. This inert gas (odorless, tasteless, and colorless) is essential for inhalation and resuscitation therapies, assisting in conditions such as hypoxia, a condition characterized by insufficient oxygen at the tissue level, usually due to low blood oxygen levels. Like medical air, healthcare professionals use oxygen supplied in ventilators to deliver respiratory support to patients with breathing difficulties. Additionally, healthcare professionals use medical oxygen in incubators to grow and develop cells, tissues, or embryos in hospital laboratories.

Manufacturers compress, cool, and condense air to create medical nitrogen, a gas valuable for powering surgical equipment. This nitrogen is particularly useful in cryosurgery, a treatment that uses nitrogen gas to achieve the extremely cold temperatures necessary to kill cancer cells and eliminate abnormal tissues. Moreover, liquefied nitrogen gas can go as low as -384 degrees Fahrenheit, making it indispensable for preserving biological materials such as tissues, cells, sperm, and bone marrow.

Healthcare professionals also use heliox 70/30, composed of helium and oxygen, to treat patients with respiratory problems such as asthma and emphysema (progressive lung disease causing breathlessness). Helium is lighter than air components, such as oxygen and nitrogen. Mixing helium with oxygen reduces its density, lowering resistance or airflow obstruction and improving patients’ ability to inhale.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) has diverse applications in health care. In addition to healthcare professionals using it as a fire suppression agent during a fire outbreak, surgeons use it for insufflation, i.e., blowing it into body cavities to improve visibility during surgery. For example, in laparoscopic surgeries (procedures allowing doctors to look inside the body with minimal incisions, CO2 is used to inflate the abdominal cavity, allowing easier surgical site access. Additionally, healthcare professionals can mix carbon dioxide with other gases to enhance respiration. Like nitrogen, CO2 can also reach low temperatures down to -104.8 degrees Fahrenheit, making it valuable in cryotherapy devices to destroy abnormal tissues and cells.

Hospitals also use nitrous oxide, an odorless and colorless gas consisting of equal parts nitrogen and oxygen, for sedation during electrodiagnosis and therapy, i.e., medical procedures involving analyzing the body's electrical activity and using electric currents to diagnose and treat certain conditions. Doctors can also use nitrous oxide in medical products to help reduce patients' pain and anxiety.

Gas manufacturers also supply argon, an increasingly popular gas with many applications in health care. For instance, healthcare professionals use argon in procedures such as tumor destruction or heart arrhythmia (irregular heartbeat) correction. Moreover, they use argon for inductively coupled plasma emission spectrometry, an analytical technique to determine the elemental composition of biological samples such as urine and blood, helping assess the level of toxic elements in the body.

Danna Leblanc

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