Research from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) sheds light on how breathing-supported therapy performs inside the human airway. These findings demonstrate the opportunity to develop better devices and more personalized treatment strategies for patients with pulmonary conditions such as bronchiectasis, cystic fibrosis and postoperative atelectasis, the authors said.
The paper, “Modeling and Simulation of Conducting Airways During Continuous High-Frequency Oscillation Therapy,” was published in Respiratory Physiology and Neurobiology.
According to the researchers, the therapeutic devices affect parts of the airway in different ways. To verify this, they employed a patient-specific 3D airway model derived from CT images that simulated the devices’ behavior within the entire airway.
Lead author Suvash C. Saha, PhD, said the study provides the strongest depiction of how breathing-supported therapy travels through the human airway. Dr. Saha is senior lecturer in the UTS School of Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering
“Continuous high-frequency oscillation therapy (CHFO) is used clinically to support airway clearance and lung expansion, yet the way its oscillatory pressure is transmitted through the human conducting airways has remained poorly measured,” said Dr. Saha in a UTS news release. “Our study helps fill that gap by mapping how CHFO reshapes pressure, wall shear stress and wall-normal loading throughout the conducting airway tree under both standard and high-pressure settings.”
Various regions of the airway, particularly the upper airway and throat, experience different levels of pressure and friction, the authors noted. This illustrates the importance of selecting precise device settings based on patient, condition and clinical goals. For example, a higher-pressure setting in this area will increase support strength but won’t impact the overall therapeutic effects, Dr. Saha said.
“The airway anatomy itself plays a dominant role in fixing where mechanical loading is concentrated. Even when the therapy setting changes, those key anatomical spots remain,” he said. “We need a greater understanding of where and how the therapy acts to help improve safety, comfort and effectiveness in the future.”
Dr. Saha said combining medical research with advanced engineering technology can help make vast improvements to therapies like CHFO.
“A computer model based on real human anatomy can reveal things that are very difficult to measure directly in patients, helping doctors and researchers make more informed decisions,” he said. “This work supports the need for more evidence-based design and testing of respiratory support devices, including patient-specific modeling where possible. It also points to the value of future clinical guidelines that consider not just whether a therapy is used, but how different settings may affect different parts of the airway.”
