Sweep? What is Sweep? You may have heard this term in reference to medicine, or you may just be familiar with what your parents had you doing to help around the house when you were younger.
To oversimplify the concept, sweep, or sweep gas, is the term used to describe the gas flow across an oxygenator membrane in extracorporeal oxygenation devices such as ECMO. If you are familiar with this concept, I hope to detail some concepts and perhaps convey some new information. If you are unfamiliar with sweep, fear not!