Influence of inspiratory and expiratory ventilation patterns on ventilatory associated lung injury

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Stefan Schumann
• Subject Area: Anaesthesiology ; Pneumology, Thoracic Surgery
• Term: from 2014 to 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 256174044

Controlled mechanical ventilation is the life-sustaining key therapy in intensive care medicine. Nevertheless, ventilator associated lung injury remains an unsolved problem. Under the conditions of controlled mechanical ventilation the temporal profile for the inspiration is defined by the ventilator and the passively occurring expiration profile is defined by the (diseased) respiratory system. With respect to ventilation pattern, the pulmonary mechanostimulation during mechanical ventilation differs fundamentally from that during spontaneous breathing. The influence of temporal components of the ventilation pattern, particularly with regard to the progress of the expiration, has not yet been analyzed systematically. The hypothesis of the submitted project is that lung tissue damage is significantly dependent on the temporal components of the ventilatory profile, especially in terms of the time course of the expiration. For that reason we propose to study the extent to which ventilator associated lung injury can be reduced by the modification of the mechanical stimulation profile in experimental lung injury models of ventilated rats.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Participating Persons: Dr. Katharina Gamerdinger; Dr. Hanna Runck