SPIROMETRIC PREDICTION EQUATIONS FOR MALE ITALIANS 7-18 YEARS OF AGE

The purpose of this study was to develop spirometric predictive equati ons (SPE) for forced vital capacity (FVC), forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1) and maximum midexpiratory flow (MMF25-75) derived f rom a large sample of healthy italian boys and male adolescents. We us ed the univariate and multiple linear regression models and considered as independent variables age and the following anthropometric measure ments: height, weight, chest circumference. The predictive power of-mu ltivariate models was slightly higher than that of the univariate mode l using height as independent variable for FVC, FEV1 and MMF25-75.