Welcome to this website. It serves as a platform for a group that is in the process of providing the world with prediction equations for pulmonary function, covering the age range from preschool children to elderly people. This entails a process that will take some time. Access to work in progress will be limited to registered members of the group.

Membership is in principle open to people

• involved in respiratory problems in industry
• who have a professional interest in the progress of this project, and/or wish to implement results once available
• who wish to contribute data
• who wish to assist with the analysis or interpretation of data.

 You can This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it by submitting a form.

This site also forms a platform for the WOLFAP initiative, a worldwide effort to anchor high quality pulmonary function testing firmly in medicine through certification of laboratories and respiratory technologists. In addition, at this stage 4 organisations of respiratory technologists are hosted on this website.

PUBLICATION ABOUT GLI  FOR   AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF R  ESPIRATORY CARE (12 Dec. 2011)

Susan Blonshine, a member of the GLI network, has written an article to raise awareness of GLI activities amongst members of the American Association of Respiratory Care.

 FINAL REPORT GLI 2012 PREDICTION EQUATIONS ACCEPTED (update 15 May 2012)

As there will be no ‘public meeting’ of the ERS Global Lung Function Initiative network at the forthcoming ATS, I am writing to you on behalf of the ERS GLI Task Force to provide a summary of work achieved over the past few years. The 2-year duration of the Task Force officially ended in April 2012, and I am delighted to report that during that period, in addition to the definitive report, we have already published 3 papers (the most recent of which is appended) and a technical report, and have presented summaries  of progress annually at major international respiratory conferences both in terms of original research findings and task force meetings.  

Our report was initially submitted to the ERS in July 2011, with subsequent review by the ERS, ATS, APSR, TSANZ and ANZRS. Following appropriate revisions to take reviewers’ comments into account, this document has now been approved, such that the equations,  together with detailed guidelines on how to implement these into commercial devices or use  them on an individual basis, will soon be available.

There will be an associated abstract presented at the ATS 2012, entitled  ‘Redefining Quality Control Criteria for Spirometry in Young Children', by Stanojevic et al. and there will be some related presentations at the ERS in Vienna (details to follow).

Enclosed is an executive summary of the current status of the GLI.

With best wishes

Janet Stocks

On behalf of the Chairs and Analytical Committee of the ERS GLI

Appendix: Publications arising from  the ERS GLI Task Force
1.       Quanjer PH, Stanojevic S, Stocks J, Hall GL, Prasad KVV, Cole TJ, Rosenthal M, Perez-Padilla R, Hankinson JL, Falaschetti E, Golshan M, Brunekreef B, Al-Rawas O, Kühr J, Trabelsi Y, Ip MSM, on behalf of the Global Lungs Initiative. Changes in the FEV1/FVC ratio during childhood and adolescence: an intercontinental study. Eur Respir J 2010; 36: 1391–1399. + Supplement
2.       Quanjer PH, Stocks J, Cole TJ, Hall GL, Stanojevic S, on behalf of the Global Lungs Initiative. Influence of secular trends and sample size on reference equations for lung function tests. Eur Respir J 2011; 37: 658–664.
3.       Quanjer PH, Hall GL, Stanojevic S, Cole TJ. Stocks J. Age and height based bias in spirometry reference equations. Eur Respir J 2012; (ePub PMID: 22183491).
4.       Quanjer PH, Stanojevic S, Stocks J, Cole TJ. GAMLSS in action. www.lungfunction.org.
5.       Quanjer PH, Stanojevic S, Cole TJ, Baur X, Hall GL, Culver B, Enright PL, Hankinson JL, Ip MSM, Zheng JP, Stocks J and the ERS Global Lung Function Initiative. Multi-ethnic reference values for spirometry for the 3-95 year age range: the Global Lung Function 2012 equations. Report on behalf of the European Respiratory Society (ERS), American Thoracic Society (ATS), Australian and New Zealand Society of Respiratory Science (ANZSRS); Asian Pacific Society for Respirology (APSR); Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand (TSANZ) + Supplement. To be submitted to Eur Respir J.

GLI 2012 EQUATIONS FOR SPIROMETRIC INDICES NOW AVAILABLE

An updated instruction on how to implement the GLI 2012 equations is now available. It not only contains instructions on how to implement the regression equations, but also provides links to the lookup tables and software (Windows platform) that allows IT engineers to check whether their implementation leads to the correct output. That same software can also be used to generated predicted values, lower limits of normal and z-scores for spirometric indices in one's own laboratory. In addition, if peole have large datasets (> 150 males and > 150 females) of healthy non-smokers, that software can also be used for validating the equations. Download the implementation instructions here.

MINUTES FROM ERS MEETING AMSTERDAM

The summary of the meeting in Amsterdam is available here. The presentations are also available ERS Amsterdam Presentations for viewing. We appreciate all of the constructive feedback and ideas shared with the group, please check our website for further updates.

Software for evaluating spirometric data now available

Software is now available for evaluating spirometric data using the "All Age" (3-80 years) equations published by Stanojevic 2008-2009. Please note that the equations used are NOT those derived from the present Global Lungs Initiative.

The software is available for download. Please note that it is designed for the Windows operating system, that it is distributed 'as is', and that despite careful testing we cannot guarantee that it will always work flawlessly. If you spot errors, please be so kind to notify us.
Nov. 2, 2011: There was an error in the calculation of FEV0.75 for a 4 year old boy. This was corrected and a new version has been uploaded.

ANNOTATED EXAMPLES OF WORKING WITH GAMLSS (18 Jan. 2012)

In response to numerous enquiries and requests for assistance, we have produced a document to help guide those who may wish to use a similar statistical approach when analysing their own data. Many people are mystified how to use GAMLSS, the statistical package that we applied to derive prediction equations for spirometry. Even some statisticians have expressed difficulty in coming to grips with the software. This is not surprising, as the learning curve is rather steep and there are certain instances in which one has to make a choice between many possibilities, the scope of which is not always immediately clear.

The analytical team wishes to facilitate the use of GAMLSS for analysing respiratory data, so that any researcher can familiarise him/herself with this technique. To that end we have produced the document “GAMLSS in action”.

Use of GAMLSS is not for the uninitiated. Therefore we suggest that you provide your statistician with a copy of the document in case GAMLSS appears to be an appropriate statistical technique for analysing your data. In order to use the examples, one needs access to a data file. This data file and the pdf are available from http://www.spirxpert.com/download/GAMLSS-in-action.zip.

Any feedback is most welcome.

Source code of software
Source code is available which anyone, including manufacturers, can use as a template, to easily implement forthcoming equations. It is based on published equations (Am J Respir Crit Care Med 2009; 180: 547-552). The source code is available upon This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ; a fully working program (Windows platform) can be downloaded from this address. July 20, 2010: new software which includes FEF25-75% and FEV0.75, and easy interpretation via pictograms.