杂志名称：Infection.

IF(2023-2024年）：7.5

发表时间：2023 Dec.

Abstract

Purpose and method: Many post-COVID patients suffer from dyspnea on exertion. To visualize exercise-induced dyspnea, a post-COVID patient and a healthy volunteer underwent an exercise test on a treadmill under stress relevant to everyday life monitored by electrical impedance tomography (EIT).

Results: The lung-healthy volunteer showed an even ventilation distribution throughout the assessment, a large ventilated area, and a butterfly-like lung shape with a convex lung rim. The post-COVID patient showed clear differences in the ventilated area compared to the control subject. During exercise, a constantly changing picture of differently ventilated areas is shown. However, especially the anterior regions were under-ventilated and larger areas were partially absent from ventilation. Overall, uncoordinated breathing and an uneven distribution of ventilation dominated the findings.

Conclusion: EIT is suitable for visualizing disturbed ventilation of the lungs, both at rest and under stress. The potential as a diagnostic tool in dyspnea assessment should be investigated.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37322387/