title: [Physiology and physiopathology of cough].
abstract: Cough clears off foreign bodies from the airways and maintains bronchial clearance when mucociliary transport is defective. Cough requires intact inspiratory muscles to inflate the lung up to 80 % of vital capacity and sound expiratory muscles to generate pressure against a closed glottis. Two mechanisms are required to facilitate proximal mucus transport: 1. Constriction of the cartilage containing airways caused by anterior bulging of the pars membranacea due to high air-flow velocity. 2. Thixotropia of the sputum. This feature changes mechanical properties in a way that sputum viscosity decreases with motion. Thixotropia is caused by the complex mucin-structure of the mucus.
authors.affiliation: Fachkrankenhaus Kloster Grafschaft, Schmallenberg. d.koehler@fkkg.de
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Köhler
mesh_terms: D001980:Bronchi / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001982:Bronchial Diseases / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D003371:Cough / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D009093:Mucus / Q000378:metabolism*