An invasive sampling of arterial blood gas (ABG) is required to measure the PaO2 for the PF. Often, patients with less severe hypoxemia may not clinically undergo ABG testing on a routine basis; hence the clinical and research utility of the SOFA scoring system is reduced. Furthermore, previous studies revealed concerns about anemia following repeated blood sampling; hence, the tendency to implement less invasive approaches have led to less frequent ABG measurements in critically ill patients3. However, almost all ICU patients are monitored with pulse oximeters, which measure the percent saturation of hemoglobin with oxygen (SpO2). Whether SpO2 can be used to impute PaO2 for determining the PF ratio has not been robustly evaluated in a prospective study of critically ill patients.