ECG Paper

What is an ECG Paper?

ECG Paper helps to record the trends of the Electrocardiogram using electrocardiogram paper. Similarly to the graph paper.

What is an Electrocardiogram (ECG)?

Electrocardiogram (ECG) is an essential part of the assessment of cardiac patients. Also ECG is the instantaneously amplified and a recorded sum of the electrical activity exhibited by cardiac muscles. Upon contraction as a response to their electrical depolarization.

Manufacturing of Electrocardiogram Paper

The white paper is the basic raw material for it. Further this paper undergoes processing through the black processing machine which coats the blank ECG paper black using black coating chemicals & In further processing, the paper is coated white using white coating chemicals.

How to Read the Trends on an Electrocardiogram Paper?

 

• Calibration of the Electrocardiogram Paper

In terms of being similar to graph paper. Generally scored at a distance of 1mm and for every 5 small boxes. A heavy line indicates a 5mm square.

• Vertical Axis

The amplitude of the heart’s electrical current measured on the vertical axis. So that measured in millivolts (mV). By standard, 10 mm in height equals 1 mV & Therefore each 1 mm square on the vertical axis equals 0.1 mV and each large square indicates 0.5 mV.

• Horizontal Axis

The horizontal axis measures time. On a standard ECG, the paper speed is 25 mm/s & Therefore, the ECG paper dimensions are such that, each 1 mm square on the horizontal axis equals 0.04 s, and each large square signifies 0.20s.

• Using the Trends For Diagnostics

The paper speed can be increased (to see wave abnormalities) or decreased (to check for rhythm disorders) & Additionally, the amplitude can also be increased (if low voltage is present) or decreased (when QRS complexes are too large) as per convenience and use.

Use of a standard ECG Paper

Standard ECG paper permits an approximate estimation of the heart rate (HR) from an ECG recording. Also calibration is performed automatically at the start of the ECG.

Calibration

An electrical 1 mV signal sent for 0.2 s. That records a rectangular shape with a 10 mm height and 5 mm width.

ECG Paper and Ease of Diagnostics

The Electrocardiogram leads on paper allow easy appreciation of heart rates. Also cardiac intervals and permits a meaningful comparison between ECGs recorded on different occasions or by different Electrocardiogram machines.