EFFECT OF LOW-FLOW AND HIGH-FLOW OXYGEN DELIVERY ON EXERCISE TOLERANCE AND SENSATION OF DYSPNEA - A STUDY COMPARING THE TRANSTRACHEAL CATHETER AND NASAL PRONGS

Hypothesis: We hypothesized that high now transtracheal oxygen (HFTTO) will improve exercise tolerance as compared with low now transtrachea l oxygen (LFTTO) and that transtracheal oxygen (TTO) will increase exe rcise tolerance with less dyspnea as compared with nasal prongs (NP) a t equivalent oxygen saturation (SaO(2)). Patient selection: Ten subjec ts, six male and four female, who were already receiving TTO were recr uited for the study. Study design: Each subject underwent a total of f our modified progressive treadmill test's in a single-blind randomized fashion on two separate days. Two tests were performed with the patie nts receiving LFITO and HFTTO while the other two were performed with low- and high-now oxygen by NP. The flows were adjusted to provide equ ivalent oxygen saturations at rest for respective groups. Results: The mean+/-SD exercise distance with HFTTO (1,134+/-631 ft) was 2.5 times greater than with LFTTO (446+/-328 ft; p<0.006); and high-flow NP (HF NP [1207+/-763 ft]) was 2.38 times greater than with low-flow NP (LFNP [492+/-487 ft; p<0.005]). There was no significant difference in exerc ise distance and dyspnea scores with HFTTO as compared with HFNP and L PPTO versus LFNP. Conclusion: We conclude that the use of high-now oxy gen via both transtracheal catheter and NP significantly increased exe rcise tolerance in our COPD patients when compared to low-now oxygen. Transtracheal oxygen did not increase maximum exercise tolerance with less dyspnea as compared with oxygen via NP at equivalent SaO(2).