The number of patients with COPD, i.e. chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, is increasing. Many patients have no idea about the disease and come to the doctor too late. The best way to spot COPD early is through spirometry. On September 17.00, such a test can be performed in the Centennial Hall in Wrocław. Start at XNUMX.
Free spirometry will be available as part of the Polish Lungs Campaign. The aim of the campaign is to educate and make Poles aware of the dangerous, but still little known, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The test that allows to diagnose it is spirometry.
For the first 80 people who will undergo the tests, the organizers have prepared a surprise – a balloon flight. Why a balloon? The lungs of COPD patients resemble an insufficiently inflated balloon.
The patient has difficulties mainly exhaling air from the lungs, although it may also be difficult to collect air from the lungs. Patients complain of shortness of breath, chest tightness and often hear their own wheezing. In Poland, 2 million adults suffer from COPD, and every year 15 thousand. dies because of it. This is probably enough to talk about the dangers of this disease more often.
What does the examination look like?
The basic test that determines their condition is spirometry, i.e. the measurement of lung capacity. The test allows you to assess whether the lungs are older than our record. Before the measurement, the following data are entered into the computer: gender, age and height, thanks to which it is known what standards are provided for our lungs.
The test itself is very simple – first we exhale, and then we draw as much air as possible into the lungs. We take a disposable mouthpiece connected with a spirometer to our mouths. We exhale the air for 6 seconds and thus measure the vital capacity of the lungs (VC), which is the largest volume of air that a person can draw into the lungs after the deepest inhalation. The second feature of the lungs that is examined during spirometry is the expiration rate (FEV1), which is the maximum volume of air that we exhale during the first second of sharply exhaling. The computer calculates the ratio of VC and FEV1 to the standards provided for us.
A healthy person after the age of 25 begins to lose approx. 15 ml of his maximum FEV1 per year (in a 25-year-old man with a height of 175 cm it is approx. 3 l). On the other hand, a patient with COPD caused by smoking loses about 50 ml of FEV1 per year. As a result, at 65, only a third of his lung tissue is working.