Chest
Original ResearchAir TravelDefinition of Cutoff Values for the Hypoxia Test Used for Preflight Testing in Young Children With Neonatal Chronic Lung Disease
Section snippets
Subjects
Children with a history of nCLD, as defined by Bancalari et al,10 who were < 5 years of age were recruited for the study. Children with nCLD must have been not received supplemental oxygen for at least 4 weeks prior to study enrollment. Healthy children, who were born after 37 weeks of gestation were completed and were between the ages of 1 week and 5 years, were also invited to participate in the study if they had already flown or were planning to fly in the near future. Written consent for
Results
A total of 88 children were studied, 19 of whom failed to complete the test. These children were aged 9 to 51 months of age (mean age, 27 months) and could not be persuaded to keep a facemask sealed to their face for the required 20 min; consequently, they were excluded from further analysis. Two of the oldest children were deaf and/or autistic, and if excluded, the children unwilling to cooperate with the hypoxia test were aged 9 to 40 months (mean age, 23 months). The remaining 69 successful
Discussion
This study of the responses of young children with a history of nCLD as well as healthy control subjects to a 20-min hypoxia challenge demonstrated that a cutoff oxygen saturation value of 85% best discriminates between these two groups. The 2004 revised BTS guideline recommending a 90% cutoff for oxygen saturation8 poorly discriminated between healthy children and those with nCLD, with 35% and 40%, respectively, of children failing the test. However, using the previous limit of 85% resulted in
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Cited by (21)
Hypoxic Challenge Test for airflight in children with respiratory disease
2017, Paediatric Respiratory ReviewsCitation Excerpt :Since not all centres have access to a body plethysmograph, an alternative method using a tight-fitting non-rebreathing facemask incorporating a one-way valve assembly has been devised, through which 14% oxygen is administered. Much of the paediatric work has come from one centre in Perth, Australia [5–7,10]. However, the validity of this technique may be an issue.
Assessing the risk of in-flight hypoxia: Chronic lung disease of prematurity and children with neuromuscular disorders
2015, Paediatrics and Child Health (United Kingdom)Air travel and the risks of hypoxia in children
2011, Paediatric Respiratory ReviewsCitation Excerpt :This decision was acknowledged as being based on limited evidence. Martin et al28 performed flight simulation tests in 24 term-born healthy children and 23 children with a history of bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) aged five years or less, showing that if cut-off level for “failing” the hypoxia test was set at 90%, 12 of the 24 healthy and 14 of the 23 BPD children failed. Conversely, at a cut-off SpO2 level of 85%, only 1 of the 24 healthy and 6 of the 23 children with BPD failed the hypoxia test.
The authors have reported to the ACCP that no significant conflicts of interest exist with any companies/organizations whose products or services may be discussed in this article.