Brian L. Graham, Martin R. Miller, Bruce R. Thompson

European Respiratory Journal 2022 59: 2200882; DOI: 10.1183/13993003.00882-2022

Extract

Provision of healthcare should not be influenced by ethnicity, skin colour or ancestry. To avoid discrimination, all healthcare practices and procedures should be systematically examined for possible influence by racism. The interpretation of spirometry is a case in point. Predicted normal values for spirometry are based on the sex, age, height and geographic ancestry of the individual. Some argue that including geographic ancestry leads to systemic racism [1, 2].

Current spirometry reference values are dependent on geographic ancestry due to differences in body structure affecting the relationship between height and lung volume. New indices are needed to develop reference values which are independent of ancestry. https://bit.ly/3P9YCJ0

Footnotes

• Conflict of interest: B.L. Graham reports personal fees for lectures from MGC Diagnostics Corporation and Vyaire Medical, personal fees for lectures and education course development from the Lung Association of Saskatchewan, personal fees for consultancy from Chiesi Farmaceutici S.p.A., and a patent use agreement from Hans Rudolph Inc, outside the submitted work; and has a patent calibration syringe device pending. M.R. Miller and B.R. Thompson have nothing to disclose.

• Received April 27, 2022.
• Accepted April 28, 2022.

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