Patent ID: 8701665

Claim:
A method for automatically controlling a ventilator, comprising: (a) determining ongoing volume and flow rate of gas to a patient during inspiration; (b) providing respiratory elastance, K, and airway resistance, K′, of the patient; (c) generating control signals controlling pressure applied by the ventilator as a sum of elastic and resistive components of pressure, the elastic component of pressure having a proportionality factor, K 1 , proportional to the determined volume of the inspiratory gas, and the resistive component of pressure having a proportionality factor, K 2 , proportional to the determined flow rate of the inspiratory gas; and (d) automatically adjusting the elastic and resistive components of pressure support by automatically finding and adjusting an elastic component of pressure support level, α=K 1 /K, and a resistive component of pressure support level, α′=K 2 /K′, and the proportionality factors K 1 and K 2 , based on a comparison between a required ventilation for the patient and an average measured ventilation for the patient.