BACKGROUND There has been considerable debate as to whether different modalities of simulated hypoxia induce similar cardiac responses. MATERIALS AND METHODS This was a prospective observational study of 14 healthy subjects aged 22-35 years. Echocardiography was performed at rest and at 15 and 120 minutes following two hours exercise under normobaric normoxia (NN) and under similar PiO2 follo...

OBJECTIVES Tracheal intubation of ICU patients is frequently associated with severe hypoxemia. Although noninvasive ventilation reduces desaturation during intubation of severely hypoxemic patients, it does not allow for per-procedure oxygenation and has not been evaluated in mild-to-moderate hypoxemic patients for whom high-flow nasal cannula oxygen may be an alternative. We sought to compare ...

BACKGROUND High sensitive CRP (hs-CRP) is used as a marker of systemic inflammation in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). However, we hypothesize that the raised hs-CRP is not closely related to the multiple consequences of COPD. This study was undertaken to investigate the association of COPD assessment test (CAT) score with SpO2, FEV1, body mass index (BMI), obstruction, dyspnea an...

A periodic breathing (PB) pattern is often observed in chronic heart failure (CHF) patients (pts). In order to clarify the role of this abnormal respiratory activity upon heart period variability we investigated, in a group of 20 stable CHF pts (NYHA class II to III, median EF 24%) showing a PB pattern, 1) whether observed data were consistent with the instability hypothesis of PB and 2) the re...

Low haemoglobin oxygen saturation (SpO2) predicts complications in children with sickle cell anaemia (SCA) in the North but there are few data from Africa, where the majority of the patients reside. We measured daytime and overnight SpO2 in children with SCA in routine follow-up clinic, and controls without symptoms of SCA, comparing rural (Kilifi, Kenya) and urban (Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania) coh...

Table 1. Application of the oxygen section of the NEWS chart to 400 routine observations rounds for 22 patients on a respiratory ward with target oxygen saturation range of 88–92%. SpO2 Number of observations (%) Number with appropriate oximetry score in NEWS (%) Satisfactory 350 (87.5) > 270 had saturation within target range > 80 had saturation >92% breathing air 22/350 (6.3) > 22 had SpO2 ≥9...

Bacillus subtilis lysogenic for SPO2 wild type was induced under conditions preventing synthesis of both bacterial and phage DNA. The infectivity of phage DNA in transfection is strongly decreased under these conditions, whereas the activity of single phage genes as measured by marker rescue with superinfecting phage is unaffected. DNA from induced cells was sedimented in neutral sucrose gradie...

BACKGROUND Chronic respiratory failure complicating sleep-disordered breathing in obese patients has important adverse clinical implications in terms of morbidity, mortality and healthcare utilisation. Screening strategies are essential to identify obese patients with chronic respiratory failure. METHOD Prospective data were collected from patients with obesity-related sleep-disordered breath...

BACKGROUND The traditional oxygen delivery methods for oxygen therapy are continuous flow oxygen (CFO) and demand oxygen delivery (DOD); however, oxygen waste is considerable in CFO, while DOD is uncomfortable for patients. Synchronized DOD (SDOD), which was designed to overcome the drawbacks of both CFO and DOD, supplies oxygen according to the patient's breathing pattern and the desired oxyge...

Pulse oximetry is dependent upon the presence of a pulsating vascular bed. Low pulsatile blood flow in the digits is caused by various factors. Regardless of the cause, if there is sufficient arterial pulse pressure, blocking the sympathetic nerve should cause a local increase in capillary flow and pulse volume. This study was performed to evaluate the effect of digital nerve block on pulse oxi...