![]() ![]() While a spirometer measures the volume of air inspired and expired by the lungs, and the ventilation movement of the air into and out of the lungs, there are other various types of spirometers that use different methods for measurement. With more people being affected by COPD every year, early detection and understanding the causes are becoming increasingly more important for public health. A spirometer will also show that a person with COPD is not able to blow air out as fast as a healthy person, with the total amount of air released in the first second being a lower proportion than that of a healthy individual. The adult male’s average total lung capacity is about 6 liters of air while a person with COPD will have an impeded flow rate, often lower compared to a normal healthy lung volume. The spirometer will then be able to measure the total amount of the patient’s exhale, called the forced vital capacity (FVC), as well as the amount of the air exhaled in the first second, which is called the forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1). Taking place in a doctor’s office, a medical professional will ask the patient to take a deep breath and then blow out as hard and fast as the patient can into a mouthpiece of a spirometer. Besides ruling out lung diseases through the Pulmonary Function Tests, the spirometer is often used for finding the reason or cause of shortness of breath, to assess the effects of medication, to determine the effects of contaminates on lung functions or whether exposure to chemicals at work affect lung function, to check the lung function before a patient has surgery, and also to measure the progress in disease treatment. Peak flow readings improve if narrowed airways open up with treatment.īelow is an example of a two-week diary of peak flow readings done by a child who has quite bad asthma.A spirometer is the main piece of medical equipment used for basic Pulmonary Function Tests (PFTs) to diagnose chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma, bronchitis, emphysema, and other conditions that affect breathing. Measuring your peak flow readings can help assess how well treatment is working. If the treatment causes a large improvement in your reading, this too is typical of asthma. Sometimes a peak flow reading is done before and after you take a dose of asthma medicine to open up your airways. This information can be used to inform your asthma action plan and help doctors make decisions to alleviate asthma symptoms or prevent asthma attacks. You will normally be asked to take a 'best of three' peak flow reading each morning and evening. ![]() Sometimes a doctor or nurse will give you a chart (like the one below), and ask you to keep a record of your peak flow readings for a week or so. This difference is much greater in people with untreated asthma than the normal small variation seen in most people. Typically, the readings are lower in the morning compared with the evening. ![]()
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