We present a case of 100% pneumothorax in a 41-yr-old man with a history of gastritis and gastroesophageal reflux scheduled for Nissen fundoplication. The patient was anaesthetized, and insufflation of the abdominal cavity with carbon dioxide was performed uneventfully. There was an increase in the peak inspiratory pressure and wheezing was noted with a decrease in the arterial oxygen saturatio...

This study addressed the effects of apnea in air and apnea with face immersion in cold water (10 degrees C) on the diving response and arterial oxygen saturation during dynamic exercise. Eight trained breath-hold divers performed steady-state exercise on a cycle ergometer at 100 W. During exercise, each subject performed 30-s apneas in air and 30-s apneas with face immersion. The heart rate and...

1. To clarify the relationship between nocturnal oxygen desaturation and erythropoietin production in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, we determined arterial oxygen saturation and serum immunoreactive erythropoietin levels over 24 h in eight patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and in nine normal subjects. 2. In the normal subjects, there was a significant cir...

Long-term oxygen therapy is initiated in England and Wales by the patient's family doctor, sometimes at the request of a hospital consultant. Guidelines for therapy exist but are not mandatory. We wish to investigate the numbers and types of patients being treated under this regimen, the method of treatment and how they responded to their oxygen dose. We therefore interviewed and tested patient...

A univentricle with parallel pulmonary and systemic circulations is inherently inefficient because mixing of pulmonary and systemic venous return occurs. Thus a cavopulmonary anastomosis is used as a staged palliative procedure to reduce volume overload in patients with cyanotic congenital heart disease. On the basis of oxygen uptake and consumption, an equation was derived that related cardiac...

IT IS WELL recognized that patients with sickle-cell disease may have a low saturation and tension of arterial blood oxygen. Although arterial anioxemia was first observed in 1942, its exact mechanism is still unknown.1 It has been shown that the hemoglobin dissociation curve of these patients is shifted to the right, probably because of a decrease in erythrocyte pH.2, 3 Therefore, a norimal le...

Patients with sickle cell disease usually have mild hypoxaemia and their oxyhaemoglobin dissociation curve is shifted to the right. It follows that oxygen saturation in sickle cell disease should be lower than normal. Most subjects in this clinic had normal oxygen saturation by pulse oximetry, however. To improve the understanding of this paradox, arterialised capillary oxygen tension (PO2) and...

The theoretic effect of increased values for the oxygen pressure at an oxygen saturation of 50 percent on oxygen delivery in arterial hypoxemia due to right-to-left shunting was analyzed using a mathematical model of the oxygen-hemoglobin equilibrium curve. We found that, regardless of the size of the shunt, a rightward shift of the curve resulted in increased mixed venous oxygen tension, incre...

COMMUNICATIONSTO THE EDITOR 551 arteriovenous oxygen content difference (C[a-v]02) equals 3; and the fractional concentration of oxygen in the inspired gas (F1o2) equals 0.40. From the oxyhemoglobin dissociation curve, the arterial oxygen saturation equals 0.90. Since C(a-v)O, equals 3, the venous oxygen saturation (Sv02) equals 0.75 approximately. Using these figures, the QS/QT equals 0.502. T...