Eur Respir J 2005; 25:186-199 Copyright ©ERS Journals Ltd 2005 doi: 10.1183/09031936.04.00113204
Flow limitation and dynamic hyperinflation: key concepts in modern respiratory physiology
P. M. A. Calverley1 and
N. G. Koulouris2
1 Clinical Science Centre, University Hospital Aintree, Liverpool, UK. 2 Respiratory Function Laboratory, Dept of Respiratory Medicine, University of Athens Medical School, "Sotiria" Hospital, Athens, Greece
CORRESPONDENCE: N. G. Koulouris, Respiratory Function Laboratory, Dept of Respiratory Medicine, University of Athens Medical School, "Sotiria" Hospital, Athens, Greece. Fax: 30 2107223420. E-mail: koulnik@med.uoa.gr
Keywords: Asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, exercise, flow limitation, hyper-inflation, physiological concepts
Received: September 30, 2004
Accepted October 12, 2004
ABSTRACT
Fashions in ideas, like clothes, come and go. From approximately 19501980, physiological research was seen as the key discipline in understanding lung disease and was at the cutting edge of pulmonary science. Subsequently, its importance has been down played amid a widely accepted but unfounded assumption that we now have a perfect working understanding of the physiological behaviour of the respiratory system in health and disease. Although it seems improbable that completely new disciplines within respiratory physiology will emerge with fundamentally different ways of describing the mechanical or gas exchanging function of the lung, advances in computing and new observations in disease have highlighted previously unsuspected physiological abnormalities that have changed the way we view lung disease and the interface between disordered lung mechanics, symptomatology and disability.
This is especially true for the two related physiological concepts of expiratory flow limitation and dynamic hyperinflation, which are now being taken from the physiological laboratory to the bedside with dramatic effect. Each arises from well-established theoretical and practical observations first made 40 yrs ago and now adapted to a range of settings, particularly in the field of obstructive lung disease. This review focuses on how these conditions are defined and assessed and what evidence there is that they might be important in lung disease.
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Copyright © 2005 by the European Respiratory Society.
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