An oxygen enrichment device for lowlanders ascending to high altitude

BioMedical Engineering OnLine

Guanghao Shen²  Xiaoming Wu¹  Chi Tang¹  Yili Yan¹  Juan Liu¹  Wei Guo¹  Da Jing¹  Tao Lei¹  Yue Tian¹  Kangning Xie¹  Erping Luo¹  Jianbao Zhang² 

[1] School of Biomedical Engineering, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710032, People's Republic of China

[2] Key Laboratory of Biomedical Information Engineering of Ministry of Education, School of Life Science and Technology, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710049, People's Republic of China

关键词: High altitude;    Oxygen enrichment membrane;    Hypoxia;    Medical devices;   

Others  :  797322
DOI  :  10.1186/1475-925X-12-100

 received in 2013-06-05, accepted in 2013-09-24,  发布年份 2013

【 摘 要 】

Background

When ascending to the high altitude, people living in low altitude areas will suffer from acute mountain sickness. The aim of this study is to test the hypothesis that whether an oxygen concentration membrane can be made and used to construct a new portable oxygen enrichment device for individuals in acute exposure to the high altitude.

Methods

The membrane was fabricated using vinylsiloxane rubber, polyphenylene oxide hydrogen silicone polymers, chloroplatinic acid and isopropyl alcohol. The membrane was assembled in a frame and the performance was tested in terms of concentration of oxygen, flow rate of oxygen enriched air, pressure ratio across the membrane and ambient temperature. Furthermore, the oxygen concentration device was constructed using the membrane, a DC fan, vacuum pump and gas buffer. A nonrandomized preliminary field test was conducted, in which eight healthy male subjects were flown to Tibet (Lhasa, 3,700 m). First, subjects wore the oxygen enrichment device and performed an incremental exercise on cycle ergometer. The test included heart rate (HR), saturation of peripheral oxygen (SpO₂) and physical work capacity (PWC). Then, after a rest period of 4 hours, the experimental protocol was repeated without oxygen enrichment device.

Results

The testing showed that the membrane could increase the oxygen concentration by up to 30%. Simulation test indicated that although the performance of the oxygen enrichment device decreased with altitudes, the oxygen concentration could still maintain 28% with flow rate of enriched air 110 cm³/s at 5000 m. The field test showed that higher SpO₂, lower HR, and better PWC (measured by the PWC-170) were observed from all the subjects using oxygen enrichment device compared with non-using (P < 0.01).

Conclusions

We concluded that the new portable oxygen enrichment device would be effective in improving exercise performance when ascending to the high altitude.

【 授权许可】

   
2013 Shen et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

【 图 表 】

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