It is extremely important to have thermometers at your home. This will help you to accurately find out if someone at your home has a fever, and then decide the next steps of the treatment. In today’s world, you would get a wide range of contact and non-contact thermometers to choose from. You can buy anyone depending on your needs and preferences. But before you do that, it is essential to understand the thermometers and how each of them works.
To get accurate results from any medical thermometers, it is very important to use them correctly. Do not use thermometers that are meant for other things and use the one you buy properly.
Digital Thermometer
They take heat sensors to determine your body temperature. You can use them to take temperatures from your armpit, mouth, or rectum.
Benefit- They provide accurate temperature readings within a minute or less.
Oral Thermometer
The oral temperatures can be taken either by a digital or a mercury thermometer. It is essential to know what your normal body temperature is, to understand if you have a fever when you feel sick.
Benefit- They work accurately in children above 3 and also in adults.
Tympanic Thermometer
This is one of the medical thermometers which uses infrared rays technology. Herein, the temperature is measured at your ear canal and its readings are generally higher than the oral temperature readings.
Benefit- They offer fast and accurate readings, and hence are preferred for children.
Forehead Thermometer
These thermometers use infrared sensors for measuring the temperature of the superficial temporal artery. Also known as non-contact thermometers, they require no physical contact for reading your temperature and they have become quite popular post-COVID. You would see that they are being used in public places like airports, stores, etc.
Benefits-
- They offer a very quick reading.
- They work effectively on people of all age groups.
- Being non-contact, there is no risk of contamination or infection spreading.
App-based Thermometer
Some digital thermometers are linked to a phone app via Bluetooth so that the temperature readings can get displayed on the app.
Benefits-
- They work just like normal digital thermometers.
- They give accurate readings within a few seconds.
- Some apps offer additional help and information about things to do if you have a high temperature.
- You can keep a record of the temperature of multiple people.
Mercury Thermometer
This is the oldest type of thermometer, which is no longer widely available due to safety concerns.
- They provide accurate readings.
- They do not need batteries to operate.
You can choose from any of these thermometers, but make sure you are using them correctly to get accurate readings. All of them are quite reliable and can be used for all age groups.
