Bronchoscopy is a very useful tool in asthma research studies. The study was undertaken to evaluate the effect of bronchoscopy, BAL and bronchial biopsies on heart rate and arrhytmias in patients with asthma.
Twenty patients (12 M, 8 F, mean age 39,6±16,3 yrs) with asthma (mean FEV1 81±19.5% pred.; mean FEV1%VC 69±12.3%) participated in the study. Holter ECG monitoring was performed twice: before (1 or 2 days) and on the day of bronchoscopy. Heart rate and cardiac arrhythmias were compared to prebronchoscopy recording at four separate time intervals: during bronchoscopy, first postbronchoscopic hour,second postbronchoscopic hour and total 24 hours.
There were no significant differences between mean heart rate at the time of bronchoscopy (88.5±14.1min-1 vs. 83.7±11.9 min-1), first and second postbronchoscopic hour(80.9±15.8min-1 vs. 85.7±13.7 min-1 and 82.6±13.6 min-1 vs. 80.6±11.6 min-1) as well as total 24 hours (76.1±11.2 min-1 vs. 75.9±9.4 min-1) as compared to prebronchoscopic recordings. Max. heart rate during bronchoscopy was higher as compared to the corresponding time of prebronchoscopic
recording (134.5±11.5 min-1 vs. 122.5±19.6 min-1,
