Interpret · Respiratory

Pulmonary function

Spirometry, volumes, diffusion, and the loop. Say the sentence in order (ratio, severity, volumes, DLCO, reversibility) and only then a disease name.

The interpretation frame

The studies

A baseline for everything else

A 30-year-old never-smoker tested before starting a research protocol.

Sixty pack-years

A 71-year-old lifelong smoker with slowly progressive exertional dyspnea. The clinic tests him between exacerbations.

Cough at night, fine by clinic time

A 24-year-old with nocturnal cough and chest tightness after exercise. Tested on a symptomatic morning.

Dry crackles and small lungs

A 63-year-old with two years of progressive dyspnea and fine end-inspiratory crackles at both bases.

Small volumes, healthy lungs

A 48-year-old with a BMI of 44 referred for dyspnea on exertion.

Wheezing that never responds

A 31-year-old treated for 'refractory asthma' with normal ACT scores between spells. Inspiratory stridor during episodes.

A box where a loop should be

A 66-year-old with a large retrosternal goiter and positional noisy breathing.

Two diseases in one report

A 72-year-old shipyard worker with fifty pack-years and pleural plaques on his radiograph, breathless for two years.

Normal spirometry, breathless anyway

A 58-year-old with systemic sclerosis, breathless on hills for six months. Her spirometry is pronounced 'normal' and she is referred for reassurance.

The bellows, not the lungs

A 61-year-old with three months of limb weakness and new orthopnea so severe he sleeps in a chair. His chest radiograph is clean.