To quote from the manual for the old Marquette Solar 8000 monitors

Cardiac Artifact Alarm
The Cardiac Artifact Alarm alerts you to the fact that the respiration
rate is within 5% of the heart rate (over 30 consecutive breaths). If this
happens, the respiration program may be counting heartbeat artifact as
respiration. The Cardiac Artifact Alarm is an advisory alarm. The
message “ARTIFACT” is displayed in the respiration values window, and
a one-beep tone sounds.
There is no adjustable limit for this alarm, but you can turn it off and on.
WARNING
If the Cardiac Artifact Alarm is turned off, apnea events
may not be detected.
To turn the alarm off and on, select the CARDIAC ARTIFACT ALARM
option from the respiration menu. This is a direct action menu option.

(Ok, 5% not 10% but I was close.........)

So a similar way of dealing with this false reading may occur in other makes of monitors such as removing the RR altogether.

Thoughts and information provided on this forum are mine and mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the policy of NSW Health. They may also be complete bollocks!!