[Active alveolar expansion for prevention of postoperative atelectasis. Functional and clinical effectiveness]

In a prospective study, the functional and clinical effectiveness of active alveolar expansion was tested by means of an incentive spirometer on 30 patients each of a treatment and control group. All patients (average age 61 and 58 years, respectively) had undergone a transabdominal pelvic artery reconstruction. Pre-operatively active alveolar expansion significantly reduced intrapulmonary right to left shunting from 11.1% to 4.2% of cardiac output (P less than 0.01). Correspondingly, right to left shunting on the second to fifth postoperative day was reduced significantly (P less than 0.05) by 5-10% of cardiac output in the treatment group, cardiac output being significantly (P less than 0.05) reduced by 1 l/min average. Clinically and radiologically there was a definite reduction in pulmonary complications from 40% to 13%. Peri-operatively performed active alveolar expansion is thus an effective method for the reduction of postoperative functional atelectasis and pulmonary complications.