Hyperventilation Overview
Learn About Hyperventilation
Hyperventilation is rapid and deep breathing. It is also called overbreathing, and it may leave you feeling breathless.
Rapid deep breathing; Breathing - rapid and deep; Overbreathing; Fast deep breathing; Respiratory rate - rapid and deep; Hyperventilation syndrome; Panic attack - hyperventilation; Anxiety - hyperventilation
You breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide. Excessive breathing creates a low level of carbon dioxide in your blood. This causes many of the symptoms of hyperventilation.
You may hyperventilate from an emotional cause such as during a panic attack. Or, it can be due to a medical problem, such as bleeding or infection.
Your health care provider will determine the cause of your hyperventilation. Rapid breathing may be a medical emergency and you need to get treated, unless you have had this before and your provider has told you that you can treat it on your own.
If you frequently overbreathe, you may have a medical problem called hyperventilation syndrome.
When you're overbreathing, you might not be aware you're breathing fast and deep. But you'll likely be aware of the other symptoms, including:
- Feeling lightheaded, dizzy, weak, or not able to think straight
- Feeling as if you can't catch your breath
- Chest pain or fast and pounding heartbeat
- Belching or bloating
- Dry mouth
- Muscle spasms in the hands and feet
- Numbness and tingling in the arms or around the mouth
- Problems sleeping
Emotional causes include:
- Anxiety and nervousness
- Panic attack
- Situations where there is a psychological advantage in having a sudden, dramatic illness (for example, somatization disorder)
- Stress
Medical causes include:
- Bleeding
- Heart problem such as heart failure or heart attack
- Drugs (such as an aspirin overdose)
- Infection such as pneumonia or sepsis
- Ketoacidosis and other medical conditions causing excess acid production in the body
- Lung disease such as asthma, COPD, or pulmonary embolism
- Pregnancy
- Severe pain
- Stimulant medicines
Your provider will examine you for other causes of your overbreathing.
If your provider has said your hyperventilation is due to anxiety, stress, or panic, there are steps you can take at home. You, your friends, and family can learn techniques to stop it from happening and prevent future attacks.
If you start hyperventilating, the goal is to raise the carbon dioxide level in your blood. This will end most of your symptoms. Ways to do this include:
If you have been diagnosed with anxiety or panic, see a mental health professional to help you understand and treat your condition.
If these methods alone don't prevent overbreathing, your provider may recommend medicine.
Contact your provider if:
- You are having rapid breathing for the first time. This may be a medical emergency for which you should be taken to the emergency room right away.
- You are in pain, have a fever, or are bleeding.
- Your hyperventilation continues or gets worse, even with home treatment.
- You also have other symptoms.
Your provider will perform a physical exam and ask about your symptoms.
Your breathing will also be checked. If you are not breathing quickly at the time, the provider may try to cause hyperventilation by telling you to breathe in a certain way. The provider will then watch how you breathe and check which muscles you're using to breathe.
Tests that may be ordered include:
- Blood tests for the oxygen and carbon dioxide levels in your blood
- Chest CT scan
- ECG to check your heart
- Ventilation/perfusion scan of your lungs to measure breathing and lung circulation
- X-rays of the chest
Hutchinson Clinic P A Inc
Robert Reed is a Family Medicine provider in Hutchinson, Kansas. Dr. Reed and is rated as an Experienced provider by MediFind in the treatment of Hyperventilation. His top areas of expertise are Parainfluenza, Parainfluenza Virus Type 3, Glucocorticoid-Remediable Aldosteronism, and Familial Hypertension. Dr. Reed is currently accepting new patients.
Aaron Watters is a Family Medicine provider in Emporia, Kansas. Dr. Watters and is rated as an Advanced provider by MediFind in the treatment of Hyperventilation. His top areas of expertise are Dehydration, Labyrinthitis, Costochondritis, and Tietz Syndrome. Dr. Watters is currently accepting new patients.
Ascentist Management
Colleen Johnson is an Otolaryngologist in Kansas City, Kansas. Dr. Johnson and is rated as an Experienced provider by MediFind in the treatment of Hyperventilation. Her top areas of expertise are Chronic Rhinosinusitis with Nasal Polyps (CRSwNP), Sinusitis, Empyema, and Infant Hearing Loss. Dr. Johnson is currently accepting new patients.
Summary: In this study the efficacy of a pulmonary rehabilitation program tailored to the needs of patients with dysfunctional breathing (DB) will be investigated using cardiopulmonary exercise testing. The pulmonary rehabilitation program will be compared with physiotherapy which is currently the mainstream therapy of DB.
Summary: The investigators propose to employ advanced multi-channel near non-invasive near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) system married with entirely non-invasive continuous arterial blood pressure (niABP) monitor to create a new wearable and portable imaging system that derives CA maps of the entire brain with high sampling rates at each point. The objectives of this project are as follows: 1. To perform i...
Published Date: July 25, 2022
Published By: Linda J. Vorvick, MD, Clinical Professor, Department of Family Medicine, UW Medicine, School of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA. Also reviewed by David C. Dugdale, MD, Medical Director, Brenda Conaway, Editorial Director, and the A.D.A.M. Editorial team.
Braithwaite SA, Wessel AL. Dyspnea. In: Walls RM, ed. Rosen's Emergency Medicine: Concepts and Clinical Practice. 10th ed. Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier; 2023:chap 21.
Schwartzstein RM, Adams L. Dyspnea. In: Broaddus VC, Ernst JD, King TE, et al, eds. Murray and Nadel's Textbook of Respiratory Medicine. 7th ed. Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier; 2022:chap 36.