Severe asthma attack, yet oxygen reading fine?!
Question: Had a severe asthma attack, audible wheezing and gasps for air. Could not take full breath without wheezing. Took 4 puffs of Albuterol until the ambulance got there. When they did, I was given a nebulizer treatment and they took me to the hospital. They put the pulse oxymeter on my finger and it read 100% but they still put a pure O2 mask on me once the nebulizer was finished. Once in the hospital I still had the mask, then they took it off. The respiratory person came, listened to my chest and said that it was still tight, they were going to give me another treatment and then a steroid (prednisone). But she said my O2 was fine.
Has that ever happened to anyone before? What accounts for that?
Answers: Had a severe asthma attack, audible wheezing and gasps for air. Could not take full breath without wheezing. Took 4 puffs of Albuterol until the ambulance got there. When they did, I was given a nebulizer treatment and they took me to the hospital. They put the pulse oxymeter on my finger and it read 100% but they still put a pure O2 mask on me once the nebulizer was finished. Once in the hospital I still had the mask, then they took it off. The respiratory person came, listened to my chest and said that it was still tight, they were going to give me another treatment and then a steroid (prednisone). But she said my O2 was fine.
Has that ever happened to anyone before? What accounts for that?
i think your asking about why your pulse ox level reads 100% even though your wheezing and tight. i think it's because your problem is not oxygenation, it's ventilation. your having increased intrapulmonary pressure caused by air trapping in your lungs. the increased pressure over distends the alveoli causing a greater oxygen level. unfortunately, when you exhale, you can't get the air out. if left untreated, the air trapping will become so great, you won't be able to move air in or out. you should concern yourself more with your co2 level. co2 levels tell whether your moving air in an out of your lungs=ventilation. co2 is an acid. if it builds up very high, it will turn your blood into an acid. you will die not from hypoxia but from respiratory acidosis. good luck, buddy...and happy breathing.
The wheezing is from narrowed airways - they are not closed off so you are still getting adequate oxygen down into your lungs and into your bloodstream - thus the good oxygen saturations. You can have an asthma attack and still have good oxygen saturations. What often happens is someone ignores the warning signs and has been having trouble breathing for several days, allowing an inflammatory process to set up and lots of the airways are narrowed, thus allowing less and less air into the lungs because of the period of time that has elapsed. Those are the people who have the low oxygen saturations. During the winter months, you should be monitoring your peak flows which will give you an indication that you are getting into trouble when your numbers start dropping. With any significant drop, you should be talking with your physician to adjust your asthma medications to ward off an asthma attack.
Technically asthma makes it difficult for you to get the air out (and to a lesser extent in) of your lungs. Unlike of respiratory illness it does not effect the oxygen's ability to cross from the lungs into the blood stream. Decrease in O2 saturation is a very late/bad sign in an asthma attack. The paramedics put everyone on an O2 mask. I don't know why. A little extra oxygen would help relax you. Nasal prongs would have been fine, and it makes you feel like they are doing something.