Co-Head, Children's Lung Health
BSc (Hons), PhD
Associate Professor Kathryn Ramsey is a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Emerging Leader (EL2) Fellow and Co-Head of Children’s Lung Health at the Telethon Kids Institute.
Kathryn received her PhD in 2013 from the University of Western Australia and began her postdoctoral career in the longitudinal surveillance of infants and children with cystic fibrosis at the Telethon Kids Institute. She was awarded an NHMRC Early Career Research Fellowship in 2015 to undertake research training in airway mucus biology at the University of North Carolina, USA. She then received a Swiss National Science Foundation Ambizione Fellowship in 2017 to lead the follow-up of a national cystic fibrosis cohort at the University of Bern, Switzerland.
She returned to the Telethon Kids Institute in 2021 to co-lead the Children’s Lung Health team. Kathryn leads a translational research program to understand disease pathophysiology and improve outcomes in children with muco-obstructive lung diseases, including cystic fibrosis, bronchiectasis, and primary ciliary dyskinesia.
Find Kathryn on ORCID
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Publications
Jun 2023
Simultaneous multiple breath washout and oxygen-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging in healthy adults
Lung function testing and lung imaging are commonly used techniques to monitor respiratory diseases, such as cystic fibrosis (CF). The nitrogen (N2) multiple-breath washout technique (MBW) has been shown to detect ventilation inhomogeneity in CF, but the underlying pathophysiological processes that are altered are often unclear.
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Children's Lung Health Lung functionOctober 2023European Respiratory Society/American Thoracic Society technical statement: standardisation of the measurement of lung volumes, 2023 update
This document updates the 2005 European Respiratory Society (ERS) and American Thoracic Society (ATS) technical standard for the measurement of lung volumes. The 2005 document integrated the recommendations of an ATS/ERS task force with those from an earlier National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute workshop that led to the publication of background papers between 1995 and 1999 and a consensus workshop report with more in-depth descriptions and discussion.
Published research Children's Lung Health Subsite: Walyan Lung functionJanuary 2023Arsenic and respiratory disease
Arsenic is the only environmental toxin that has been linked to both malignant and nonmalignant respiratory disease following ingestion, rather than inhalation, making arsenic a unique toxicant to the respiratory system. Chronic exposure to arsenic has been associated with the development of respiratory symptoms, impaired lung function, and chronic lung disease.
Published research Children's Lung Health Respiratory viral infectionsSeptember 2022Monitoring disease progression in childhood bronchiectasis
Bronchiectasis (not related to cystic fibrosis) is a chronic lung disease caused by a range of etiologies but characterized by abnormal airway dilatation, recurrent respiratory symptoms, impaired quality of life and reduced life expectancy.
Published research Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for Kids Subsite: Walyan BREATH Immune systemOctober 2022Normative data for multiple breath washout outcomes in school-aged Caucasian children
The multiple breath nitrogen washout (N2MBW) technique is increasingly used to assess the degree of ventilation inhomogeneity in school-aged children with lung disease. However, reference values for healthy children are currently not available.
Published research Early Childhood Development Children's Lung HealthNovember 2021Quality of life is poorly correlated to lung disease severity in school-aged children with cystic fibrosis
There is no data exclusively on the relationship between health-related quality-of-life (HRQOL) and lung disease severity in early school-aged children with cystic fibrosis (CF). Using data from the Australian Respiratory Early Surveillance Team for Cystic Fibrosis (AREST CF) we assessed the relationships between HRQOL, lung function and structure.
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Children's Lung HealthMarch 2018Preschool Multiple-Breath Washout Testing. An Official American Thoracic Society Technical Statement
Consensus recommendations are outlined to direct preschool device design, test performance, and data analysis for the MBW technique
Published research Children's Lung HealthJanuary 2018The clinical utility of lung clearance index in early cystic fibrosis lung disease is not impacted by the number of multiple-breath washout trials
This study aimed to determine if relationships between LCI and clinical outcomes of CF lung disease differ when only two acceptable MBW trials are assessed.
Published research Children's Lung HealthNovember 2017Effect of posture on lung ventilation distribution and associations with structure in children with cystic fibrosis
Background: We assessed the effect of posture on ventilation distribution and the impact on associations with structural lung disease.
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for KidsSeptember 2017Multiple-breath washout outcomes are sensitive to inflammation and infection in children with cystic fibrosis
The lung clearance index may be a useful surveillance tool for monitoring the presence and extent of lower airway inflammation and infection
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for KidsSeptember 2017Air trapping in early cystic fibrosis lung disease-Does CT tell the full story?
Mosaic attenuation on expiratory chest computed tomography (CT) is common in early life cystic fibrosis (CF) and often referred to as "air trapping"
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for KidsJanuary 2017End-inspiratory molar mass step correction for analysis of infant multiple breath washout tests
We aimed to evaluate the use of the EIMM-step method in a broad range of infants.
Published research Children's Lung HealthJanuary 2016A systematic approach to multiple breath nitrogen washout test quality
The application of the systematic review improved inter-observer agreement but did not affect reported multiple breath washout outcomes
Published research Children's Lung HealthJanuary 2016Lung Clearance Index and Structural Lung Disease on Computed Tomography in Early Cystic Fibrosis
Lung clearance index may be a useful surveillance tool to monitor structural lung disease in preschool and school-age children with cystic fibrosis
Cystic Fibrosis Published researchSeptember 2015Impact of lung disease on respiratory impedance in young children with cystic fibrosis
The present study investigated whether lung function measured by forced oscillation technique would be impaired in the presence of infection,...
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Academic Biostatistics Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for KidsSeptember 2015Progressive ventilation inhomogeneity in infants with cystic fibrosis after pulmonary infection
This study aimed to determine how pulmonary inflammation & infection impacts on ventilation distribution throughout early life in people with cystic fibrosis.
Cystic Fibrosis Published research Academic Biostatistics Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for KidsNovember 2014Early respiratory infection is associated with reduced spirometry in children with cystic fibrosis
We hypothesized that the presence of these markers of cystic fibrosis lung disease in the first 2 years of life would be associated with reduced lung...
Published research Academic Biostatistics Children's Lung Health P4 Respiratory Health for Kids -
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