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TLC VC FEV1 waaaaaaaat?
17 Jul 2008 08:52 pmSo anyhow, yesterday we had a go at spirometry, which is the exotic way of saying "measuring how much air and other things you can pack into your lungs". Well, that's "measuring how much air" and "measuring other things", not..."how much air and other things you can pack into your lungs".
So yeah, my lung capacity was approximately normal when I did the same thing on a cheaper machine 3 years ago. Now it's like...10% over normal. And apparently Asians are meant to have smaller lung capacity (for the same height and age) than the Caucasian values.
So either playing the clarinet (which I started after then) increased my lung capacity or I'm just better at using those accessory muscles now XD (Or the machines could be badly calibrated...ah, experimental errors)
I also discovered that I instinctively glottal stop and take a new breath towards the end of exhalation...maybe because the clarinet squeaks too often and I often try to catch a breath before it does? XD
I don't see how you're supposed to keep exhaling for 6 seconds when you get at least 80% of your vital capacity (the max volume of air you can breathe out) out in the first second and the flow rate decreases in a linear fashion =/ I need Jenny the maths whiz to help!
Maybe if I took up the trumpet (or, for the sake of it, the sousaphone XD) my lung capacity would increase by 20%? =D
In other news, I brought an unopened packet of wafers to my tutorial on Tuesday, and I turn away for 5 minutes and there was only one wafer left =/
Our group's getting better and better at the game. Today we finished a 3 hour tute in one and a half hours, even with a lot of unrelated tangents and jokes =0=;
Anyhow, our course, like all health/medical science-related courses, continues to propagate smoking-hate. I reckon you have to be living in some sort of prehistoric hole to not know about the risks of smoking by now, so if you still haven't given up you either 1) can't, or 2) won't, and realistically there's probably not all that much you can do for either of those patients.
SMOKING KILLS. Slowly and painfully and in a thousand ways. And your doctor will give you evil looks =D
PS: For those who can read Chinese, this is a cute health article XD
So yeah, my lung capacity was approximately normal when I did the same thing on a cheaper machine 3 years ago. Now it's like...10% over normal. And apparently Asians are meant to have smaller lung capacity (for the same height and age) than the Caucasian values.
So either playing the clarinet (which I started after then) increased my lung capacity or I'm just better at using those accessory muscles now XD (Or the machines could be badly calibrated...ah, experimental errors)
I also discovered that I instinctively glottal stop and take a new breath towards the end of exhalation...maybe because the clarinet squeaks too often and I often try to catch a breath before it does? XD
I don't see how you're supposed to keep exhaling for 6 seconds when you get at least 80% of your vital capacity (the max volume of air you can breathe out) out in the first second and the flow rate decreases in a linear fashion =/ I need Jenny the maths whiz to help!
Maybe if I took up the trumpet (or, for the sake of it, the sousaphone XD) my lung capacity would increase by 20%? =D
In other news, I brought an unopened packet of wafers to my tutorial on Tuesday, and I turn away for 5 minutes and there was only one wafer left =/
Our group's getting better and better at the game. Today we finished a 3 hour tute in one and a half hours, even with a lot of unrelated tangents and jokes =0=;
Anyhow, our course, like all health/medical science-related courses, continues to propagate smoking-hate. I reckon you have to be living in some sort of prehistoric hole to not know about the risks of smoking by now, so if you still haven't given up you either 1) can't, or 2) won't, and realistically there's probably not all that much you can do for either of those patients.
SMOKING KILLS. Slowly and painfully and in a thousand ways. And your doctor will give you evil looks =D
PS: For those who can read Chinese, this is a cute health article XD
