The doctors and staff of Florida Lung, Asthma and Sleep Specialists have recently discovered some significant research from England.
The studies predict doctors will soon have a cool new diagnostic tool, with a funny name: The Sneezometer.
“Scientists at the University of Surrey in Guildford, England, have indeed, created the world’s first Sneezeometer — an airflow sensor or spirometer device sufficiently sensitive to measure the speed of a sneeze…” You might call it the ultra-spirometer!
Specifically, the Sneezometer measures the flow of air through lungs. The research scientists claim that no other commercially available system can measure breath in the lungs as inexpensively or effectively, or as quickly and meticulously.
Amazingly, the active models have been produced with 3-D printing technology.
If the new device will perform as well as researchers currently believe, it will be twice as fast, and much more sensitive than current spirometers. Proponents of the new device say Surrey’s Sneezometer meticulously measures the flow of air through a patient’s lungs, although it is about the size of your fist.
The device can pick up very small breath fluctuations which are often connected to disease. The researchers are still studying the nuances of the instrument.
Clinical Trials in Progress
We won’t have to wait too long for the new technology. “The Sneezeometer is currently in clinical trials at King’s College Hospital in London, and researchers said if trials and approvals go well, it could be available for clinical use in two years.”
At the present time, FLASS as well as all other respiratory doctors and staff utilize traditional Spirometers. The patient blows into a tube that measures “the airfl
ow rate through a patient’s lungs.”
Spirometic readings aid in the diagnosis of a large number of both chronic and acute respiratory conditions like OSA, and hyperpnoea, and of course, asthma.
Surrey researchers have developed the Sneezometer to bring more sensitivity to the readings. The Sneezometer will also be easier to use with neonatal patients due to its extreme sensitivity and smaller size.
Diagnosing Debilitating Respiratory Illnesses Simply
Dr. David Birch, lead investigator of the Surrey Fluid Sensor Development Initiative at the University of Surrey’s Aerodynamics and Environmental Flow research
group, said “Breathing disorders are highly prevalent in both the developed and developing world.”
He added pointedly, “In the USA, asthma alone costs $56 million a year and the human cost is high, too — about nine deaths every day.”
Like the spirometer, the sneezometer is non-invasive. The machine can do its work by simply analyzing the breath of a patient. It is as unobtrusive as that classic symbol of medicine, the stethoscope. Dr. Paul Nathan, who has gained his experience by designing and managing fully-automated measurement systems for Brittain’s NCAS EnFlo national laboratory, stated, “We have created a portable, highly sensitive and accurate spirometer that can catch the speed of a sneeze.”
He also pointed out the quick, economical turn-around and ease of manufacture by stating, “What’s almost as impressive is that we created this innovative device using simple 3D printing technology, with all of the prototypes ‘printed’ around the internal electronics.”
Sneezometers and the Effects of Pollution
Recently the World Health Organization declared air pollution as one of the top 10 health risks faced by the people of Earth.
This fact inspired University of Surrey Reader and 
former senior lecturer Dr. Prashant Kumar when he stated, “The availability of an inexpensive and portable diagnostic device such as this will assist in such diseases being diagnosed and treated at earlier stages.”
At FLASS, we hope the device will become a newly effective diagnostic tool because 18 million Americans are currently suffering with the disease. Sadly, we also know that almost ten per cent of America’s children are among those afflicted with asthma.
Diagnosis is essential to treatment, and the early in the development of the disease, the better! So make way for the Sneezometer!
As the Florida Lung, Asthma and Sleep Specialists have said previously, what seems like the science fiction of yesterday often becomes the clinical trial for today’s research, and then the treatment or cure or diagnostic tool for tomorrow’s illness.