Dyspnea

Category: Illness or disabilities

Type

Involuntary

Introduction and description

Shortness of breath, also known as dyspnea, is defined by The American Thoracic Society as "a subjective experience of breathing discomfort that consists of qualitatively distinct sensations that vary in intensity".

Distinct sensations include chest tightness and air hunger - the feeling of not getting enough oxygen -  everything in fact from gasping for breath, to simply feeling puffed. 

Symptoms

According to the eHealthme website which gathers adverse drug reports from doctors in the USA that have been submitted to SEDA and the FDA, the most common symptoms are:

• Breathing difficulty - (3,058 reports)
• Drug ineffective - (1,461 reports)
• Cough - (751 reports)
• Fatigue - (638 reports)
• Malaise - (603 reports)
• Pain - (573 reports)
• Chest pain - (557 reports)
• Dizziness - (521 reports)
• Nausea - (509 reports)

Causes

Dyspnea is not strictly speaking an illness, as shortness of breath can be the result of a great list of actual illnesses and diseases, and is a normal symptom of heavy exertion. 

Pharmaceuticals

According to the eHealthme site, over 313,722 reports from FDA and social media in the USA alone, have been submitted citing doctor prescribed pharmaceuticals as the cause of the Dyspnea.  We have provided a very small number of observations showing that hallucinations are often a side-effect of the lack of oxygen.

Pharmaceuticals implicated in causing Dyspnea can be found by following this LINK.  If the LINK is broken then use the eHealthme site to find the symptom of Dyspnea, scroll down the page and you will find a heading - 'Drugs that cause'.  You will find such apparently benign drugs as paracetemol and aspirin in this list - around 4000 plus drugs were present as at mid 2017.

Illnesses and disease

While shortness of breath is generally caused by disorders of the cardiac or respiratory system, other systems such as neurological, musculoskeletal, endocrine, and hematologic, can also result in the same symptoms.  “DiagnosisPro, an online medical expert system, listed 497 distinct causes in October 2010.”  Just a small number of the illnesses that have this as a symptom include:

• Asthma
• Emphysema
• Pneumonia
• Cardiac ischemia
• Interstitial lung disease
• Congestive heart failure
• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
• Acute myocardial infarction
• Pulmonary oedema
• Obesity
• Psittacosis

And so on.  The eHealthme site also has a list of the conditions that can cause Dyspnea - use this LINK to get an up-to date list.

Extreme emotion

There is one cause of shortness of breath, however, which is overlooked and is always worth considering – very high emotion.  With the readiness doctors have for prescribing pharmaceuticals for symptoms, it is an important cause, as it is more than possible that many a case of asthma in children or emphysema in old people was actually due to fear or grief, loneliness and isolation:

Panic attacks are an extreme form of dyspnea, that can be brought on by fear and grief for example.

Treatment

Find the cause. 

NO PHARMACEUTICALS ARE NEEDED.

There is every indication from the evidence on eHealthme, that the very use of pharmaceuticals produces not alleviates this condition.  Thus finding the cause as opposed to alleviatiing the symptoms is absolutely KEY.

If you get a panic attack, the danger is that you over-breathe as such breathing into a paper bag which recycles the carbon dioxide can help. 

But the best remedy for a panic attack is to start doing something so absorbing that the mind is diverted from the ‘threat’ that caused the panic. 

Long term you need to address the threat.

 

 

Related observations

Healing observations

• Music, relaxation and COPD 005831
• The Healing Power of Sleep 026790

Hallucination

• Acute psychosis caused by digitalis 005083
• Amphotericin 006894
• Azithromycin and the elderly 005419
• Azithromycin and Zithromax 001136
• Maxalt 005746
• Vyvanse 001514

In time

Synaesthesia, Pure or enhanced perception, Inter composer communication, Vision, Dream, Perception recall, Exploring group perception

• Azithromycin and the elderly 005419