Health & Environmental Research Online (HERO)


Print Feedback Export to File
3041812 
Journal Article 
Measurement of fluid deposition in humans following mist tent therapy 
Bau, SK; Aspin, N; Wood, DE; Levison, H 
1971 
1 
Pediatrics
ISSN: 0031-4005
EISSN: 1098-4275 
IPA/72/64458 
VOL 48 ISS Oct 1971 
REF 17 
605-612 
English 
IPA COPYRIGHT: ASHP The effectiveness of mist tent therapy for cystic fibrosis was assessed by labeling the aerosol from an ultrasonic nebulizer with technetium 99m and measuring the distribution of radioactivity in subjects who breathed the aerosol in a mist tent. Three different ultrasonic nebulizers were used. Labeled deionized water or propylene glycol 10% was used as the nebulizing fluid. Six healthy adults and 8 cystic fibrosis patients breathed from a tent for an hour after which the radioactive uptake was measured by a scintillation probe and its distribution with a rectilinear scanner. Less than 5% of the radioactivity nebulized and distributed in the tent entered the body; of this, 90% of the inhaled radioactivity initially lodged in the nasopharynx and rapidly appeared in the stomach. Very little activity was detected over the lungs. If mist tents are of therapeutic value for cystic fibrosis, the benefits do not arise from the deposition of significant quantities of fluid in the lungs, thinning the mucous secretions and promoting their removal from the airways.