A Prognostic Model for the Respiratory Function of Patients with Nonsevere Pulmonary Infection Based on Breathing Exercises and Acupuncture Therapy: Development and Validation

OBJECTIVE: In this study, a prognostic model for the respiratory function was constructed based on the treatment methods of patients with nonsevere pulmonary infection, aiming to provide a reference for clinical decision-making. METHOD: A total of 500 patients with nonsevere pulmonary infection were included in this study. The patients were randomized into training set (n = 350) and validation set (n = 150), and the baseline characteristics were collected. All patients received breathing exercises or breathing exercises combined with acupuncture therapy for 3 months, and then the forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1)/forced vital capacity (FVC) was assessed. Next, an ordinal multinomial logistic regression model was used to analyze prognostic factors affecting respiratory function of patients with nonsevere pulmonary infection. The Test of Parallel Lines was used to determine the accuracy (ACC) of the model and screen the influencing factors. The confusion matrix was drawn, and the ACC and harmonic mean (F1 score) were calculated to evaluate the feasibility of the model results. RESULTS: Results of the ordinal multinomial logistic regression model showed that age (P = 0.000), treatment method (P = 0.000), underlying diseases (P < 0.001), and sex (P = 0.389) were independent factors affecting the respiratory function of patients in the training set. The ACC value of the training set was 88.86%, and that of the validation set was 91.33%, indicating a high accuracy and favorable predictive ability of the model. Besides, the F1 score was 62.38%, indicating a high reliability of the model. CONCLUSION: The prognostic model for respiratory function of patients with nonsevere pulmonary infection constructed in this study had favorable predictive performance, which is of great significance in the clinical nursing and treatment of patients with pulmonary infection.