Chest
Clinical InvestigationsMeasurement of Respiratory Sensation in Interstitial Lung Disease: Evaluation of Clinical Dyspnea Ratings and Magnitude Scaling
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MATERIALS AND METHODS
Twenty patients with ILD and ten healthy control subjects recruited from employees of the medical center participated in the study. The diagnosis of ILD was based on a chest radiograph showing bilateral interstitial markings and normal heart size, pulmonary function tests, and histologic confirmation of an infiltrative process. The following different types of ILD were represented: idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (n = 11); connective tissue disease (n = 2); sarcoidosis (n = 2); hypersensitivity
RESULTS
Anthropometric data and results of lung function and exercise parameters for both the patient and control groups are presented in Table 1. Age, gender, height and weight were comparable in the two groups. Patients with ILD exhibited significantly lower levels of lung function (FVC and FEV1) compared with control subjects.
The values for the clinical rating of breathlessness represented a wide spectrum in the ILD patients. The range of ratings was 0 to 3 for the MRC scale, 25 to 95 mm for the
DISCUSSION
The data from this investigation increase our understanding of respiratory sensations in ILD. In two previous reports different clinical systems have been described for grading dyspnea during the course of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.11, 12 In addition, psychophysical experiments using both threshold detection and magnitude scaling techniques have been conducted in small numbers of patients with ILD.13, 14 More recently, we have demonstrated modest correlations between respiratory function
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors thank T. Lentine, J. McGovern, and J. Ward for their technical assistance.
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This study was supported by a Biomedical Research Support Grant from the National Institute of Health, Training Grant No. HL-07449 from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, and by a grant from the New Hampshire Affiliate of the American Heart Association.
Manuscript received September 29; revision accepted February 16.