Augmented leads are defined as leads that measure cardiac activity from one electrode on the body at a time and readings are larger.

• A. Bipolar leads
• B. Augmented leads
• C. Amplifier
• D. Baseline

Answer: (B)

Augmented leads are unipolar ECG leads that measure cardiac activity from a single limb electrode against a common reference point created from the other limb electrodes (the Wilson central terminal). Because the measurement uses one electrode with a composite reference rather than a direct difference between two electrodes, the ECG machine amplifies these signals, so their deflections appear larger to be comparable with the bipolar leads. These leads—named for the limb electrodes they involve (one electrode as the positive lead against the reference from the others)—provide views of electrical activity from different directions: right arm, left arm, and left leg. This is different from bipolar leads, which directly compare the voltage between two electrodes and don’t undergo that same single-electrode amplification. An amplifier is a part of the ECG system, not a type of lead, and a baseline is just the reference zero level used for measuring voltages.