Luciana Friedrich, Paulo M. C. Pitrez, Renato T. Stein, Marcelo Goldani, Robert Tepper and Marcus H. Jones
After producing a previous report showing that a group of healthy infants born at 32–34 weeks' gestation and without respiratory complications had decreased forced expiratory flows and normal forced vital capacities at 2 months of age, the authors are investigating whether or not these children are improving their lung function during their second year of life. After performing measurement of forced expiratory flows using rapid thoracic compression technique, it was demonstrated that these infants had persistently reduced flows despite normal forced vital capacity and absence of catch-up growth in airway function. This suggest that premature birth is associated with altered lung development.
Published ahead of print on September 20, 2007, American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine Vol 176. pp. 1269-1273, (2007)