Anyone learning to interpret pulmonary function tests has probably already been educated on pulmonary anatomy, physiology and disease processes. These subjects are a necessary foundation but what is most often missing is exposure to real-world testing problems.  Lectures and textbooks usually assume that pulmonary function results are accurate.  The reality is that interpretation has to work with test results whose quality can range from fair to poor.

Interpreting pulmonary function tests looks deceptively simple and straightforward but this is not the case and there are numerous subtleties that are not easily evident. As a notable example of this the first computer program to interpret spirometry (PUFF) was developed in the mid-1970’s. Since that time a number of computer algorithms using branching logic, fuzzy logic, Bayesian statistics, neural networks and expert systems have been attempted but their overall accuracy remains unacceptably low.  The reason for this is that no computer program has yet been devised to be able to assess test quality and the effect this has on interpretation.

The purpose of this website’s tutorials, examples and quizzes is to provide education on the detection of test errors and the effect these errors have on test results. This knowledge can give an interpreter the ability to provide high quality interpretations using low quality results, and this is the goal of this website.

Registration is not required to access the tutorials, examples and quizzes.  There is no fee or charge to register however, and registered users are able to download or print a scorecard of their progress.

This website is still a work in progress and remains:

Not all features are present or complete at this time.

Feel free to browse the website.  Comments, suggestions and corrections are always welcome.