Mechanical ventilation is a lifesaving activity
that is used in critical care management. In such case,
monitoring of airway resistance(Raw) and lung
compliance(CL) play a major role for diagnosing the
lung condition, setting the ventilator parameters, can
act as a decision parameter for weaning the patient
from the ventilator. Several methods have been
described for estimating these respiratory parameters.
In this work, a study is conducted to compare two
different methods used to calculate airway resistance
and lung compliance during mechanical ventilation.
Michigan Adult/Infant lung simulator is used to
simulate different compliance conditions and Michigan
Pneuflo Resistors to simulate different resistance
conditions. Flow, volume and pressure data were logged
for different set parameters i.e. for different resistance
and compliance combinations. Later these data were
used to calculate the respiratory system resistance and
compliance. Two methods were used to calculate lung
parameters, dynamic approach and Least Square
fitting(LSF) method(using respiratory system equation
of motion). Both methods gave accurate estimate of Raw
and CL. But the dynamic approach required respiratory
maneuver whereas LSF approach required large
datasets to carry out the calculation and the patient
should not show any active breathing during evaluation
Keywords : Mechanical ventilation, Airway Resistance, Lung Compliance, Equation of motion, Least Square Fit, Dynamic approach.