TY - JOUR T1 - Airspace Dimension Assessment (AiDA) for early detection of lung function impairment in the peripheral airways of firefighters JF - ERJ Open Research JO - erjor DO - 10.1183/23120541.00504-2022 SP - 00504-2022 AU - Marta A. Kisiel AU - Gui-Hong Cai AU - Madeleine Petersson Sjögren AU - Jakob Löndahl AU - Jonas Jakobsson AU - Per Wollmer AU - Andrei Malinovschi AU - Magnus Svartengren Y1 - 2023/01/01 UR - http://openres.ersjournals.com/content/early/2023/02/02/23120541.00504-2022.abstract N2 - Introduction Firefighters have increased risk of chronic respiratory disease. Standard clinical techniques used in medical checkups may not detect the earliest microstructural changes in peripheral airways. A new technique called Airspace Dimension Assessment (AiDA) has been shown to enable early detection of emphysema in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. This method may be useful in the occupational setting to detect early pulmonary changes and enable prevention.Aim To evaluate whether AiDA detects changes in the most peripheral airways of firefighters.Methods AiDA, measuring the effective airspace radius (rAiDA) and zero-second recovery (R0), was used as a complement to other standardised lung function measures in 21 male firefighters and 16 age-matched male controls.Results There were significant differences in rAiDA and R0 between firefighters (mean rAiDA 0.301 mm, standard deviation (sd) 0.024; mean R0 0.336 arbitrary units, sd 0.116 and controls (mean rAiDA 0.276 mm, sd 0.044; mean R0 0.576 arbitrary units, sd 0.168), p=0.03 and p<0.001, respectively. Higher forced vital capacity was found in firefighters (mean 101% of predicted) than in controls (mean 93% of predicted; p=0.03). No significant differences were found with regard to either the ratio between forced expiratory volume in 1 s and forced vital capacity or forced expiratory volume in 1 s. The majority of firefighters had diffusing capacity for carbon monoxide, oscillometry and single-breath nitrogen washout values within the normal ranges.Conclusion AiDA parameters can provide information on early pulmonary peripheral changes that may not be seen with standard techniques used in screening of pulmonary function.FootnotesThis manuscript has recently been accepted for publication in the ERJ Open Research. It is published here in its accepted form prior to copyediting and typesetting by our production team. After these production processes are complete and the authors have approved the resulting proofs, the article will move to the latest issue of the ERJOR online. Please open or download the PDF to view this article.Conflict of interest: Prof. P Wollmer and Assoc. Prof. J. Löndahl have a patent issued for a “Device and Method for pulmonary function measurements.” The other authors declare no competing interests. ER -