Pulmonary Function of Convalescent Patients with SARS:A five-year successive observation

Objective To investigate the remote outcome of pulmonary dysfunction left in patients with serious acute respiratory syndrome(SARS)through observing the functional changes of convalescent SARS patients.Methods Totally 46 SARS patients were divided as normal and abnormal groups according to their pulmonary diffusion function.Seven-time follow-ups were conducted in five years to observe the changing trends of pulmonary function for the patients in the two groups.Results During the follow-ups in the five years,in normal group no statistically significant changes were found(P0.05);but in abnormal group,there were significantly increasing trends in the three parameters of diffusing capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide predicted percent(DLco%),total lung capacity predicted percent(TLC%)and residual volume predicted percent(RV%)(P0.05).Conclusion The damages of pulmonary function induced by SARS were different from that in pulmonary fibrosis,most of which could recover gradually.