Chest
Original Research: AsthmaEfficacy of a Heat Exchanger Mask in Cold Exercise-Induced Asthma
Section snippets
Materials and Methods
All subjects gave consent to participate in this Institutional Review Board-approved protocol. There were two studies. In study 1, 13 subjects with asthma symptoms during cold air exercise were recruited. Inclusion criteria included a postbronchodilator FEV1 > 70% predicted and a methacholine challenge test with a provocative concentration of methacholine resulting in a 20% drop in FEV1 ≤ 8 mg/mL. Exclusion criteria included the presence of other lung diseases, use of systemic or inhaled
Results
Study 1 enrolled 13 subjects, and study 2 enrolled 5 subjects. All subjects met inclusion and exclusion criteria, and no subjects dropped out. Of the 15 people who participated in one or both studies, 9 were women, and the average age of participants was 29 years (Table 1). Mean baseline FEV1 was 3.24 ± 0.17 L (88 ± 4.0% of predicted).
Study 1 subjects demonstrated improved lung function after exercise with the active device, compared to placebo (Fig 2). The mean fall in FEV1 was 19 ± 4.9% with
Discussion
This heat exchanger mask is highly effective at blocking cold air exercise-induced decline in lung function. The mean decrease in FEV1 was 19 ± 4.9% with placebo, and 4.3 ± 1.6% with the active device (p = 0.0002). While all subjects had better lung function after exercise with the active device compared to placebo, those individuals who demonstrated a > 10% decline in FEV1 with placebo exercise had the most dramatic improvement with the active device mask (Fig 2). For example, subject 1 had a
Acknowledgment
The authors thank George Zeman, Martin Carlos, and the staff of the National Jewish Pulmonary Physiology Unit for their assistance with exercise testing, as well as Misoo C. Ellison, PhD, for her contributions to our statistical analysis. We are also indebted to Terri Harper, PA-C, and Mary Gill, RN, BSN, for their excellent help with recruitment and subject visits.
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Reproduction of this article is prohibited without written permission from the American College of Chest Physicians (www.chestjournal.org/misc/reprints.shtml).
Funding was provided by the National Jewish Medical and Research Center.