Life Support For Respiratory Failure

Introduction

Many lung conditons in the end stage result in respiratory failure. This is a condition where the lung no longer can "deliver the goods": in other words, not enough oxygen gets into the lungs and/or not enough carbon dioxide leaves the lungs at the same time. This results in "hypoxemia" (lack of oxygen in the blood stream) or "hypercapnia" (too much carbon dioxide in the blood stream).

The causes can be complex. For instance, an inability to breathe when the breathing muscles are weak in the late stages of muscular dystrophy leads to respiratory failure. On the other hand in the end stages of COPD, emphysema or pulmonary fibrosis respiratory failure is often also found. In these cases though it is because the lung tissue can no longer transport the gases(O2 and CO2) across the membranes of the air sacs.

The diffusion back and forth into and from the blood stream is impaired. However, a pneumothorax from a gunshot wound can get a patient into respiratory failure with a coma very quickly and life support with intubation and mechanical ventilation is needed until the patient eventually recovers. Depending on whether the patient can still breathe on his own, various kinds of mechanical assistance can be given: CPAP, PPV, PEEP or BiPAP. These are abbreviations of various machine assisted breathing possibilities. These links will explain more to those who would like more information. You may also want to search specific items on the Google search engine on top of this page.

Home Page

Lung Disease

Disclaimer

This outline is only a teaching aid to patients and should stimulate you to ask the right questions when seeing your doctor. However, the responsibility of treatment stays in the hands of your doctor and you.

References

2. National Asthma Education and Prevention Program. Expert Panel Report II. National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, 1997.

6. Merck Manual 1999. Section 6: Pulmonary disorders

Last Modified: Dec. 12, 2007