Cheap Stethoscopes

If you are new to medicine a good stethoscope is a necessity to perfrom your professional skills. A cheap stethoscope often found for less than $15 may get you into more trouble than the dollars that it saves you.

I still remember my first day as a Student Ambulance Paramedic, when the Ambulance Service I worked for at the time provided me with a cheap, $15 Stethoscope. I took the stethoscope and tried to listen to a healthy persons’s chest and then to a brick wall – they both sounded identical. I then listened to a simmulator’s lung sounds that were supposed to describe a patient in acute pulmonary oedema and then back to the brick wall – again, they both sounded identical. I realised then and there, that cheap stethoscopes aren’t worth the few measley dollars we spend on them.

Personally, I believe that, of all the medical equipment that we eventually buy and utilise in Medicine, as Paramedics, Nurses or Physiotherapists, the Stethoscope must be of the highest quality and is the most useful to our ability to perform our day to day jobs. Consequently, I recommend spending that extra bit of money on a good quality Stethoscope such as a: Littmann’s Stethoscope, Littmann’s Cardiology Stethoscope, or Littmann’s Cardiology III.

Where to Buy Cheap Stethoscopes

Okay, so you’re still keen to buy cheap stethoscopes. Where should you go to buy cheap stethoscopes? The following are good starting points to find a good cheap stethoscope:

1. At a hospital look for medical notice boards that often advertise Medical Student’s previously loved cheap stethoscopes (which they are discarding now that they are practicing medicine),

2. Check on line at places like E-bay, Facebook, and swap sites for second hand pre-loved cheap stethoscopes.

3. You can buy cheap stethoscopes at most on-line medical supply stores from about $15, which probably wont help much if you are practicing cardiology, but should be fine for taking blood pressures and listening to basic lung sounds.