Hallo. I got a copy of my spirometry test to monitor my COPD. The nurse had put Male in computer when working it out. I pointed out I was female and was told it made no difference. Is this true? The internet site I looked at gave a different answer. When I questioned her again I was told the sites were not reliable. Please advise. Thank you.
Confused!!!!!!!!
You would think it would make some difference or what would be the point of having male and female options lesley
Thats what I thought.!!!!!!!!
It doesn't inspire a lot of confidence if they can't get your gender right 🤔
Well I would have thought that it made a difference because men have a larger body structure and generally stronger muscles which could mean that they blow out more efficiently, but hey, who knows in the wonderful worls of gender fluidity!
Thanks. I think the best thing is to re book another appointment in 6 months. Both the BLF and NHS sites say male or female is one of the 4 criteria used together with height age and ethnicity
Not a bad idea- less stressful. Though why she just couldn’t do it properly in the first place defeats me.
If it was you first test it would be important because they are using comparisons to predicted - benchmarks gathered from people of the same sex .
But as an ongoing monitor they are comparing your actual measures (results) to your results in previous years - not against benchmarks - so for their internal purposes it'll make no difference. .. but for your records you'd have to (remember to) ignore the predicted column in this years result.
Best wishes
Greetings
I had much the same thing happen; as a male, my FEV1 was 25%, but as a woman, they went up to 30%. Ask her to re-run the results!
Cheers
Catnip
Men have bigger lungs so i would think it would make a difference x
It would definitely make a difference in the values shown as predicted and If you have the results and want to post them you can help you determine the correct predicted values as that information as available online.
Thank you to all. I have learnt more about my COPD from this site than from my GP. I cant post my own results on line as they don't seem to have any easily recognizable columns giving just one reading. I will get the F numbers etc on my next spirometry & put them into the internet sites & find out whether I am 1,2,3 or 4. ( I only learnt about this from you, not the GP!)
Spirometry test. 
Spirometry test
Spirometry
spirometry test
