Respiratory monitoring: revisiting classical physiological principles with new tools

When interviewing junior doctors wishing to work in a hospital, a common question, at least in the UK, is to ask them to name an important development in respiratory medicine in the past 10 yrs. Since young doctors like results, they often suggest some therapeutic aspect of applied physiology, such as noninvasive ventilation. In fact, we propose that, even in the post-genomic age, the immediacy of physiology never really loses its appeal throughout most doctors' careers. Indeed, we suspect that, increasingly, accurate physiological techniques will acquire greater importance, as we seek to understand and evaluate the effects of interventions that are inspired by our increasing knowledge of the molecular and genetic basis of disease, a concept first highlighted in the European Respiratory Journal a decade ago 1. In this model …