Controlling drug delivery apparatus

A system for delivery of a drug to a patient comprising:

• a drug delivery device arranged to deliver a dose of the drug to the patient over a plurality of breaths, the device including a breath analyser which
• (i) analyses a patient's breathing during drug delivery, wherein the analysis by the breath analyzer includes quantitatively measuring at least one parameter of the patient's breathing;
• and
• (ii) generates breath information on a patient's breathing during drug delivery wherein the breath information includes the at least one quantitative measurement of the patient's breathing;
• a data carrier onto which the drug delivery device is arranged to place the breath information for a number of treatments;
• a data analyser arranged to analyze the breath information from the data carrier, and to derive characteristics of the patient's breathing;
• and
• a trend generator for analyzing the breath information and the characteristics of the patient's breathing over a number of treatments, wherein the breath information includes a number of breaths per minute and a mean tidal volume, and wherein the data analyser calculates a minute volume value by dividing the number of breaths per minute by the mean tidal volume.

A system for delivery of a drug to a patient comprising:

• a drug delivery device arranged to deliver a dose of the drug to the patient over a plurality of breaths, the device including a breath analyser which
• (i) analyses a patient's breathing during drug delivery, wherein the analysis by the breath analyzer includes quantitatively measuring at least one parameter of the patient's breathing;
• and
• (ii) generates breath information on a patient's breathing during drug delivery wherein the breath information includes the at least one quantitative measurement of the patient's breathing;
• a data carrier onto which the drug delivery device is arranged to place the breath information for a number of treatments;
• a data analyser arranged to analyze the breath information from the data carrier, and to derive characteristics of the patient's breathing;
• and
• a trend generator for analyzing the breath information and the characteristics of the patient's breathing over a number of treatments,wherein the breath information further includes a mean inhalation flow and a mean inhalation time, and wherein the data analyser calculates a mean tidal volume value by multiplying the mean inhalation flow with the mean inhalation time with 0.7 and dividing by 60.

A method of identifying changes in condition of a patient over a number of treatments from a drug delivery device comprising:

• analyzing a patient's breathing during drug delivery, including quantitatively measuring at least one parameter of that breathing;
• generating breath information from the patient's breathing during drug delivery, including the quantitative measurement of that breathing;
• transferring the breath information to a data analyser;
• deriving characteristics of the patient's breathing from the breath information;
• and
• analyzing the characteristics of the patient's treatments over a number of treatments to identify trends in those characteristics, wherein the step of quantitatively measuring at least one parameter includes a total treatment time, a total inhalation time, and a total exhalation time, and wherein the step of deriving characteristics of the patient's breathing includes calculating a total no flow time value by subtracting the total inhalation time and the total exhalation time from the total treatment time.

A method of identifying changes in condition of a patient over a number of treatments from a drug delivery device comprising:

• analyzing a patient's breathing during drug delivery, including quantitatively measuring at least one parameter of that breathing;
• generating breath information from the patient's breathing during drug delivery, including the quantitative measurement of that breathing;
• transferring the breath information to a data analyser;
• deriving characteristics of the patient's breathing from the breath information;
• and
• analyzing the characteristics of the patient's treatments over a number of treatments to identify trends in those characteristics, wherein the step of quantitatively measuring at least one parameter includes measuring a number of breaths per minute and a mean tidal volume, and wherein the step of deriving characteristics of the patient's breathing includes calculating a minute volume value by dividing the number of breaths per minute by the mean tidal volume.

A method of identifying changes in condition of a patient over a number of treatments from a drug delivery device comprising:

• analyzing a patient's breathing during drug delivery, including quantitatively measuring at least one parameter of that breathing;
• generating breath information from the patient's breathing during drug delivery, including the quantitative measurement of that breathing;
• transferring the breath information to a data analyser;
• deriving characteristics of the patient's breathing from the breath information;
• and
• analyzing the characteristics of the patient's treatments over a number of treatments to identify trends in those characteristics, wherein the step of quantitatively measuring at least one parameter further includes measuring a mean inhalation flow and a mean inhalation time, and wherein the step of deriving characteristics includes calculating a mean tidal volume value by multiplying the mean inhalation flow with the mean inhalation time with 0.7 and dividing by 60.