Advances in Physiology Education, Vol 260, Issue 6 6-S9, Copyright © 1991 by American Physiological Society
Model to facilitate studying oxygen and carbon dioxide transport
K. A. Gaar Jr
Department of Physiology and Biophysics, School of Medicine, Louisiana State University Medical Center, Shreveport 71130-3932.
A simple model has been constructed for microcomputer (PC) simulations
involving basic cardiopulmonary principles of oxygen transport. Students
can change parameters such as metabolic rate, blood hemoglobin
concentration, barometric pressure, air composition, etc., and study
parameter effects on blood gas concentrations and partial pressures. An
important feature of the model program is that there are no negative
feedback controls to maintain homeostasis. However, after a perturbation
has been introduced, adjustments can be made to appropriate variables to
correct for abnormal effects. For example, ventilation rate and blood
hemoglobin concentration might be adjusted to compensate for low
atmospheric oxygen. Because these do not change automatically in the model
program, learning is enhanced when the student has to make the appropriate
adjustments needed to correct disturbances in the blood gases that follow a
perturbation.
