Hyperventilation syndrome medical therapy

A rapid traditional intervention is to have the patient breathe into a paper bag, causing rebreathing and restoration of CO₂ levels. Some physicians do not advise the paper bag rebreathing method due to the possibility of inhaling too much carbon dioxide. One other potential side effect of this treatment is that, it may cause significant hypoxemia and consequent complications.^[1] The same benefits can be obtained from deliberately slowing down the breathing rate by counting or looking at a the second hand on a watch. This is often referred to as “7-11 breathing”, because a gentle inhalation is stretched out to take 7 seconds (or counts), and the exhalation is slowed to take 11 seconds.

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