BACKGROUND The diagnosis of COPD is dependent upon clinical judgment and confirmation of the presence of airflow obstruction using spirometry. Spirometry is now routinely available; however, spirometry incorrectly performed or interpreted can lead to misdiagnosis. We aimed to determine whether spirometry undertaken in primary care for patients suspected to have COPD was of sufficient quality an...

BACKGROUND Objective measurement of airflow obstruction by spirometry is an essential part of the diagnosis of asthma or COPD. During exacerbations, the feasibility and utility of spirometry to confirm the diagnosis of asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are unclear. Addressing these gaps in knowledge may help define the need for confirmatory testing in clinical care and qual...

background the relationship between gastroesophageal reflux (gerd) and airway diseases is still a matter of debate. oscillometry is an objective, independent tool for the evaluation of airway resistance. the main purpose of this study is to comparespirometry and oscillometry results before and after treatment by a proton pump inhibitor (ppi) in a group of gerd patients who have no respiratory s...

introduction: adenotonsillar hypertrophy is a typical cause of surgery in children. evaluation and identification of patients as potential candidates tonsillectomy is a primary concern for otolaryngologists. this study focuses on the results of pulmonary function tests (pfts) after tonsillectomy in children. materials and methods: this cross-sectional study examined 50 patients suffering from t...

BACKGROUND We recently demonstrated that quality of spirometry in primary care could markedly improve with remote offline support from specialized professionals. It is hypothesized that implementation of automatic online assessment of quality of spirometry using information and communication technologies may significantly enhance the potential for extensive deployment of a high quality spiromet...

BACKGROUND To increase recognition of airflow obstruction in primary care, we compared two models of spirometry delivery in a target group at risk of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). METHODS A 6 month qualitative/quantitative cluster randomised study in eight practices compared opportunistic spirometry by "visiting trained nurses" (TN) with optimised "usual care" (UC) from genera...

BACKGROUND Socioeconomic status is known to influence the prevalence, severity and mortality of obstructive lung diseases, but it is uncertain whether it affects the use of diagnostic spirometry in patients initiating treatment for these conditions. The objective of this paper was to examine a possible association between education, income, labour market affiliation, cohabitation status and hav...