Question

Sometimes it is necessary to document a patient's Inspiratory to Expiratory ratio. Your patient's total respiratoy time was 4 seconds. If your patient's inspiration lasted 1.3 seconds and expiration lasted 2.7 seconds what is your patient's I:E ratio? Hint- convert numbers to a ratio with the inspiratory (I) being one. Show your work.

Answer 1

Inhalation rate in 1 minute :

Multiply the no. Of times inhaled ( take it as 10) in 30 secs by 2. Therefore,

10 × 2

= 20 times inhalation in 1min.

Exploratory rate:

Substract the inspiratory rate from 60 .

20 - 60

= 40 sec in 1 min.

Write the inspiratory and expiratory rate as a ratio.

Ie. 20:40

Now, reduce the ratio by dividing each number by the greatest common factor shared by the 2 numbers . Above the greatest shared common factor is 20. Dividing 20/20 gives 1 and dividing 40 by 20 gives 2.

Therefore the inspiratory and exploratory ratio is 1:2.