Acute Disturbance of Lung Function in Pneumonia

Lobar pneumonia is defined as an acute infection characterized by an inflammation of the lungs and a bacterial toxemia. It is customary to consider the disease mainly from anatomic and etiologic points of view. Thus, a case of pneumonia is referred to as presenting involvement of the right lower lobe or left lower lobe due to pneumococcus type I or type II, as the case may be. It is not likely to be considered from the point of view of functional interference with the normal function of the lung; namely, the diffusion of oxygen and carbon dioxide. The physician who treats heart disease is no longer satisfied with anatomic and etiologic diagnoses, such as mitral stenosis due to rheumatic fever, but wishes to know in addition whether cardiac insufficiency is present. One might point also to the interest in renal function in nephritis and to pancreatic function in diabetes. In