The effectiveness of oxygen conserving device of a demand oxygen delivery system based on FIO2 equivalency

Abstract

Recently demand oxygen delivery (DOD) system has been preferred to continuous flow oxygen (CFO) method for long term oxygen therapy in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, since DOD system supplies oxygen during only inhalation and saves oxygen consumption. However, the oxygen saving ratio have not properly compared without considering fraction of inspired oxygen (FIO2), though FIO2 determines the efficacy of treatment. The purpose of this study was 1) to investigate the equivalence between the CFO method and a DOD system in terms of FIO2 with considering dead space under various breathing parameters, 2) to propose and calculate the new effective oxygen saving ratio of the DOD method, 3) to compare FIO2 obtained from calculation with that from experiment. The mathematical and experimental models of human respiratory system were developed. FIO2 was calculated depending upon various breathing parameters and the new effective oxygen saving ratio was calculated to accurately compare oxygen saving consumption between the DOD and CFO method. Results of this study have shown that as supplied volume of oxygen increased, FIO2 linearly increased. As beat per minute or tidal volume increased, FIO2 decreased. The obtained FIO2 between mathematical model and experiment showed errors less than 5% in CFO method and less than 11% in DOD method. Effective conserving oxygen ratios of the DOD system changed between 3.4 and 3.8, but had higher values when the volume of supplied oxygen was larger. In conclusion, CFO method had different equivalent values of FIO2 depending on breathing parameters. Therefore it is appropriate to take into account of FIO2 when considering performance of oxygen saving devices. The effective oxygen saving ratio proposed in this study may provide the new valuable index of oxygen saving of the DOD method while maintaining the same treatment effect compared with CFO method. In addition, the mathematical model developed in this study seems to predict FIO2 similarly as obtained using experiment.