Is blood ever blue?

Anonymous2006-10-16T05:41:41Z

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Blood is generally happy all the time.

Anonymous2006-10-16T12:49:42Z

The blood is only red. I believe you have asked this question in connection with what is called BLUE BABY - If so read below:

Blue baby syndrome (or simply, blue baby) is a layman's term used to describe newborns with cyanotic conditions, such as:

Cyanotic heart defects
Tetralogy of Fallot
Dextro-Transposition of the great arteries
Hypoplastic left heart syndrome
Methemoglobinemia
Respiratory distress syndrome
On November 29, 1944, the Johns Hopkins Hospital was the first to successfully perform an operation to relieve this syndrome. The syndrome was brought to the attention of surgeon Alfred Blalock and his laboratory assistant Vivien Thomas in 1943 by pediatric cardiologist Helen Taussig, who had treated hundreds of children with Tetralogy of Fallot in her work at Hopkins' Harriet Lane Home for Invalid Children. The two men adapted a surgical procedure they had earlier developed for another purpose, involving the anastomosis, or joining, of the subclavian artery to the pulmonary artery, which allowed the blood another chance to become oxygenated. The procedure became known as the Blalock-Taussig shunt, although in recent years the contribution of Vivien Thomas, both experimentally and clinically, has been widely acknowledged.

timc_fla2006-10-16T12:40:52Z

Color
In humans and other hemoglobin-using creatures, oxygenated blood is bright red. This is due to oxygenated iron in the red blood cells. Deoxygenated blood is a darker shade of red, which can be seen during blood donation and when venous blood samples are taken. However, due to an optical effect caused by the way in which light penetrates through the skin, veins typically appear blue in color. This has led to a common misconception that venous blood is blue before it is exposed to air. Another reason for this misconception is that medical charts always show venous blood as blue in order to distinguish it from arterial blood which is depicted as red on the same chart.

crystal2006-10-16T12:47:57Z

Blood is actually blue until Oxygen hits it hence your veins are ...blue

MrSmarT2006-10-16T12:40:54Z

is there such thing as Blue Blood Cells ?

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