Estimation of Flow Through Bronchial-Pulmonary Vascular Anastomoses with Use of T-1824 Dye

Abstract

A dye-dilution method devised to estimate the individual outputs of the ventricles has been used to assess the magnitude of the flow through bronchial-pulmonary anastomoses in patients with chronic lung disease. In 10 normal subjects the output of the left ventricle was, on the average, 0.9 per cent larger than the output of the right. In six patients with advanced pulmonary tuberculosis, the average value was 2.9 per cent, and in 11 patients with bronchiectasis 9.3 per cent. One patient, who had had her left main pulmonary artery ligated, exhibited an anastomotic flow of 20 per cent. In all groups the flow calculated from the Fick equation agreed within 20 per cent with that from the right ventricle. In the normal subjects and the patients with tuberculosis, the same general agreement between the Fick and the left ventricular output was observed. But in the patients with bronchiectasis and the woman with the ligated pulmonary artery, the Fick calculation underestimated the left ventricular output. This underestimation suggests that the blood traversing the bronchial-pulmonary anastomoses had an oxygen content approximating that in the systemic arterial blood.