The Ketchup-Bottle Method

Abstract

At least two generations of physicians have been taught that retention of excessive secretions in the respiratory tract is not only bad for pulmonary function but also can be lethal to the patient. In fact, there is persuasive clinical and pathological evidence that patients have drowned because their alveoli were filled with edema fluid instead of air or have suffocated because widespread plugging of bronchi and bronchioles by mucus prevented alveolar ventilation. These observations resulted in several therapeutic axioms for controlling secretions, and a new subdiscipline — respiratory physical therapy — developed to implement these axioms.Respiratory therapy is primarily . . .