Oxygen Tent Research Articles

Quatre cents consultations médicales pour les maladies des enfants.

Comby has written the pediatrician's vade mecum. It is an alphabetical arrangement of pediatric therapeutics. Treatment is detailed in numbered paragraphs followed by brief descriptions of the clinical entities in smaller type. The material is decidedly useful. The alert physician will appreciate that, aside from broad general principles, details of treatment differ with individuals, institutions, localities and countries. It is surprising, therefore, that so much of the author's treatment meets the approval of American physicians. A few comparisons may be made. From the medical point of view we have shown more resourcefulness in the treatment of pneumonia by means of the oxygen tent and oxygen chamber. There is no mention of skin testing in allergic conditions such as asthma and eczema. It is gratifying to find the author's recommendation of spinal puncture in epileptic states. On the other hand, the rôle of heredity in this condition is denied. Migraine should

GAS ANALYSIS WITH AN ALL-GLASS SYRINGE FOR PNEUMONIA TENTS

Oxygen tents are now coming into extensive use for the treatment of pneumonia. As a rule, analysis of the atmosphere in these tents is unnecessary. If the gas is passed in at the rate of 7 or 8 liters a minute, there is a considerable diffusion of air inward and oxygen outward through the bedclothes, even if the curtains of the tent are tucked in tightly. The result is a concentration of 40 to 50, or at most 60, per cent of oxygen. Higher concentrations are inadvisable. The reactions of the patient are really the most significant indication of the best concentration. For purposes of investigation, however, and particularly for a special form of tent for the administration of mixtures of oxygen and carbon dioxide soon to be introduced, gas analyses are convenient. But as precise gas analysis is a highly specialized technic, which is usually unfamiliar to a hospital

Oxygen treatment with special reference to treatment of complications incident to goiter

We believe that the therapeutic administration of oxygen by means of the chamber or tent is most helpful in a restricted group of cases, such as postoperative pulmonary edema, bronchopneumonia, and respiratory obstruction. The patients who show most marked benefit are those with evidence of anoxemia, or of impending anoxemia. Treatment should be begun as early as is possible, as in many instances the progress of pulmonary edema to pneumonia probably can be averted. Treatment should be continuous, or as nearly continuous as possible, until the pathologic process is well controlled. Binger and others have called attention to the deleterious effects of oxygen concentrations of 70 per cent or more. We have not raised the oxygen above 60 per cent for more than a few hours at a time. From these concentrations we have not seen harmful effect. Treatment with oxygen can be carried out more efficiently in oxygen chambers than in oxygen tents, although excellent results can be obtained in tents properly manipulated. We do not know that the life of any individual patient has been saved by oxygen treatment; however, we believe that at least an occasional patient is saved when marked lowering of the temperature and increased comfort can be secured in such a large series of patients who are seriously ill. Our results not only warrant the continuation of this method of treatment but indicate the advisability of more general adoption of efficient methods of the administration of oxygen in those diseases known to be benefited by its use. The patients who obtain the greatest benefit are those with postoperative pulmonary edema, bronchopneumonia, or respiratory obstruction accompanied by cyanosis or impending cyanosis.

OXYGEN IN THE TREATMENT OF POSTOPERATIVE BRONCHOPNEUMONIA

In the symposium on treatment with oxygen in cases of pneumonia that was presented last year at the meeting of the Association of American Physicians, Binger, 1 Barach 2 and Boothby 3 suggested that the disrepute of such treatment could be accounted for by the ineffectiveness of former methods of administering the oxygen. They then described the newer apparatus, the oxygen chamber and the oxygen tent, by means of which it is possible to envelop the patient, or his head, in an atmosphere of any concentration of oxygen desired. They demonstrated that with atmospheres of about 50 per cent oxygen, anoxemia could usually be controlled, and the patient with pneumonia improved subjectively; the temperature and pulse often fell dramatically. The present report is concerned chiefly with the treatment with oxygen in cases of postoperative pneumonia at The Mayo Clinic. Up to Jan. 1, 1927, oxygen had been used in only

A NEW OXYGEN TENT

The accompanying illustration shows a new oxygen tent that provides a cooler atmosphere and is in general more comfortable to the patient than those previously described. It encloses the head and chest of the patient, being smaller than the portable tent of Barach and Binger1and larger than the head tent of Roth.2The head tent idea of Roth has been employed. The tent is suspended from an arm carried by a standard which is mounted on an easily movable four-wheeled base. The frame of the tent or hood consists of a flat piece of aluminum 2 feet square and flanged on all four sides for the attachment of the tent material. The latter consists of rubberized silk into which are attached two celluloid windows 21 inches square. The aluminum frame that forms the roof has a window of celluloid in the middle 19 inches square.

A PORTABLE OXYGEN TENT

recent years the therapeutic use of oxygen has undergone a new trial. Effective methods of administration have been introduced, and a study of the changes in the oxygen content of the arterial blood during treatment has been made. The results indicate that the adequate employment of oxygen in conditions of acute anoxemia is generally followed by clinical improvement, and that an abnormally low arterial oxygen saturation is usually restored to, or near to, the normal value. no report in which oxygen has been effectively administered is a contrary view upheld. Opinions based on experiences with ineffective methods are no longer germane to effective oxygen treatment. Haldane 1 says: In the light of present knowledge it is childish to suppose that as soon as anoxemia is relieved a patient will recover, or that anoxemia is itself a trifling matter if life is not immediately imperiled. If there were only