Lung-Protective Settings vs. Hypercapnia for the Attenuation of Ventilator Associated Lung Injury and Systemic Inflammation

Patients who suffer from lung injury struggle to breath, and therefore they require help from a ventilator. While some ventilation settings improve lung injury, other settings worsen the injury. For that reason, it is important to use the correct settings to protect lungs from further damage, and help patients breath better. Lung injury may be caused by several methods, one of which is gastric acid entry into the lungs. In this project, I will examine the effects of different mechanical ventilation settings in rats with acid-induced lung injury. Specifically, I am interested in determining which ventilator settings and whether high carbon dioxide levels will help rats breath better and decrease inflammation in the body. This will be achieved using six experimental groups, all of which will have different manipulations of respiratory rate, carbon dioxide levels and tidal volume. Findings from this research could potentially help numerous patients in Canada who currently suffer from Acute Lung Injury (ALI) or Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS). As well, these findings may be of help to intensive care unit (ICU) professionals in choosing the correct ventilation settings for patients with various respiratory ailments.