Patient emulator: a tool for testing mechanical ventilation therapies.

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Respiratory Physiology
• Computational Medicine

Background:

• Clinical mechanical ventilation modes lack clear comparative efficacy data.
• Human and animal trials for ventilation therapies are challenging and expensive.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel patient emulator (PE) for in-silico testing of mechanical ventilation.
• To validate the PE's capability in simulating patient responses to ventilation therapies.

Main Methods:

• Developed a large-scale integrated mathematical model of the human cardiopulmonary system.
• Interfaced the model with a physical ventilator using a controlled piston-cylinder actuator.
• Simulated a pressure support ventilation protocol and compared results with human subject data.

Main Results:

• The patient emulator (PE) successfully simulated a realistic pressure support ventilation protocol.
• PE-simulated patient responses showed strong agreement with averaged data from 33 human subjects.
• Demonstrated the PE's potential as a viable alternative to conventional trials.

Conclusions:

• The developed patient emulator (PE) provides a promising platform for in-silico testing of mechanical ventilation.
• The PE can reduce the cost and complexity associated with evaluating new ventilation strategies.
• This system has the potential to accelerate the development and optimization of mechanical ventilation therapies.