The Upper Airway Exercise Breathing Center at UPMC

February 7, 2020 The Upper Airway Exercise Breathing Center at UPMC, which launched in January 2020, offers Continuous Laryngoscopy Evaluation (CLE) during exercise for amateur and elite athletes, as well as nonathletes, with unexplained exertional shortness of breath. Patients 14 years and older are evaluated with state-of-the-art diagnostics and receive treatment specifically designed for people with breathing problems while exercising. UPMC is the second academic medical center in the United States to offer this diagnostic procedure for exercise-induced laryngeal obstruction (EILO). Other tests include exercise spirometry, methacholine challenge test (with laryngoscopy), and cardiopulmonary exercise testing with CLE. Additionally, therapeutic respiratory retraining techniques via biofeedback will be provided during CLE.

Diagnostic CLE tests at UPMC are performed by a multidisciplinary Allergy/Respiratory/ENT team. Our experts include Andrej A. Petrov, MD, from the Division of Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care Medicine, and Jackie Gartner-Schmidt, PhD, CCC-SLP, a dyspnea-specialized speech-language pathologist and director of the Speech-Language Pathology-Voice Division in the Department of Otolaryngology and co-director of the UPMC Voice Center. 

Exercise is important. Whether your patients are working out for general health benefits or competition, our center helps patients achieve their goals.

Referrals to the Upper Airway Exercise Breathing Center at UPMC can be made to ExerciseBreathing@upmc.edu, or call 412-692-4557.