Let us look at the history of
official Western breathing standards. The current norms at rest for a 70-kg man
can be found in medical and physiological textbooks: CO2 - 40 mm Hg (or about
5.3% at sea level), ventilation - 6 l/min, the CP - 40 s.
How did the main parameter “40 mm Hg CO2” appear? Through experimentation, it
was established by the famous British researchers Charles G. Douglas and John S.
Haldane from Oxford University about a century ago. Their results were published
in the article "The regulation of normal breathing" by the Journal of Physiology
(Douglas & Haldane, 1909). The investigators analyzed arterial blood gases of
staff members at Oxford University, including scientists and support personnel,
and found an average. It is possible to argue that even during those times many
University workers had a sedentary life style with little physical activity.
Hence, their usual CO2 concentrations could be lower than those for most healthy
people. Indeed, another old study by the also famous Karl Albert Hasselbalch had
about 45 mm Hg as an average value for breathing at rest (Hasselbalch, 1912).
Some textbooks define hyperventilation as a state with less than 40 mm Hg CO2
while others (and most) less than 35 mm Hg. More recent textbooks often have 8-9
l/min as “normal values”. Some modern clinical studies used the CO2 values of
volunteers as a standard for comparison with sick people and found small
differences between groups. In some recent studies, CO2 values of “healthy
volunteers” can be as low as 34-36 mm Hg. If most modern people are chronic
hyperventilators (according to official standards), should new average values
become our new standards?
From a practical viewpoint, Russian medical research indicates that people with
30-40 s CP still can have certain serious health problems, many of which
disappear with further progress in breathing parameters. Sixty seconds CPs and
6.5% CO2 (or about 46% mm Hg CO2), on the other hand, are indicators of vibrant
health in which many modern diseases are impossible. If disease-free health is
the goal of modern medicine, would it not make sense to accept Buteyko’s
standards that provide a guarantee of excellent health?
Is it possible that some people can have large CPs while still having
health problems or being sick?
Situations with unusually large CPs are very rare, but they were described in
medical literature. Some brain surgeries involve the medulla of the brain (the
location of the breathing center) or the nerve cells that control respiratory
muscles. In these cases, CO2 sensitivity can decrease or totally disappear
causing artificially large CPs.
In real life, people with, for example, sleep apnea and emphysema usually have
CPs that are slightly higher than the CPs that one could expect visually
estimating their breathing patterns.
Some people are genetically predisposed to cardiovascular problems. If such
people frequently perform very long breath holds, it is possible that their
small blood vessels have not been able to adjust (or dilate) due to this sudden
transition to higher CO2 levels and that may result in some abnormalities in,
for example, blood perfusion. This results in abnormally high CPs.
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