A patient is suffering from an airway obstruction that is reducing his pulmonary
ID: 3516525 • Letter: A
Question
A patient is suffering from an airway obstruction that is reducing his pulmonary ventilation.
What effect might this have on his PCO2 levels? Explain
What effect might this have on blood pH?
A patient is nervous about seeing her physician and begins to breathe rapidly.
What effect might this have on his PCO2 levels? Explain
What effect might this have on blood pH?
A patient is on high doses of morphine for pain, and as a result has an extremely slow rate of breathing.
What effect might this have on his PCO2 levels? Explain
What effect might this have on blood pH?
Explanation / Answer
1. pCO2 (Partial Pressure of Carbon Dioxide) reflects the the amount of carbon dioxide gas dissolved in the blood.
Indirectly, the pCO2 reflects the exchange of this gas through the lungs to the outside air. Two factors each have a significant impact on the pCO2. The first is how rapidly and deeply the individual is breathing:
The second is the lungs capacity for freely exchanging CO2 across the alveolar membrane:
With an acute asthmatic attack, even though the alveoli are functioning normally, there may be enough upper and middle airway obstruction to block alveolar ventilation, leading to CO2 retention.
ph level:
Respiratory acidosis is characterized by an increased arterial blood PCO2 and H+ ion concentration. The major cause of respiratory acidosis is alveolar hypoventilation. The expected physiologic response is an increased PHCO3. The increase in concentration of bicarbonate ions (HCO3) in plasma (PHCO3) is tiny in patients with acute respiratory acidosis, but is much larger in patients with chronic respiratory acidosis.
2. Hyperventilating will "blow off" more CO2, leading to lower pCO2 levels
pH is elevated (more alkaline, higher pH) with Hyperventilation.
3.Respiration is stimulated by high levels of pCO2 in your blood. The primary cause of high pCO2 levels is hypoventilation.
Respiratory acidosis in which decreased ventilation (hypoventilation) increases the concentration of carbon dioxide in the blood and decreases the blood's pH.
Carbon dioxide is produced continuously as the body's cells respire, and this CO2 will accumulate rapidly if the lungs do not adequately expel it through alveolar ventilation. Alveolar hypoventilation thus leads to an increased PaCO2 . The increase in PaCO2 in turn decreases the HCO3?/PaCO2 ratio and decreases pH.
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