A stethoscope is an acoustic medical device used to listen to internal body sounds, such as heartbeats, lung respiration, and bowel movements. It consists of a chestpiece for capturing sound, flexible rubber or PVC tubing, and eartips that transmit the audio directly to the practitioner's ears.
Chestpiece: The circular component placed on the patient's skin. It typically features two sides: a diaphragm (a flat, circular surface for detecting higher-frequency sounds) and a bell (a smaller, cup-shaped end for lower-frequency sounds).
Tubing: The flexible, hollow pipeline that carries sound waves from the chestpiece up to the headset, while blocking out external ambient noise.
Headset: The metal tubes (eartubes) attached to the top of the tubing that hold the eartips snugly in the user's ears.
