Control of Breathing in Health and Disease

Book excerpt: This useful reference provides comprehensive reviews of the physiological foundations of the control of breathing and offers new insights into the pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management of breathing disorders in respiratory, cardiac, neuromuscular, and metabolic-endocrine diseases. Control of Breathing in Health and Disease sheds new light on the central neural mechanisms controlling breathing and the important chemical, neuromechanical, and behavioral systems that are responsible for setting the level and pattern of breathing investigates the neural basis of respiratory sensation and the mechanisms of breathlessness addresses the systems that are responsible for assuring the adequacy of ventilation during exercise considers the structural, mechanical, and neural mechanisms influencing upper airway patency reviews the physiological mechanisms of Cheyne-Stokes breathing charts the influence of gender, menstrual cycle, and pregnancy on ventilatory control presents current approaches to the clinical assessment of the control of breathing discusses breathing abnormalities in the newborn and infants and changes in breathing patterns in the elderly evaluates the mechanisms and management of sleep-disordered breathing analyzes abnormalities in breathing control in chronic obstructive and interstitial lung diseases, heart failure, neurological diseases, muscular dystrophy, and thyroid disorders, diabetes, and acromegaly outlines modern approaches to the management of respiratory failure and more! Including more than 2200 references, tables, equations, and drawings, Control of Breathing in Health and Disease benefits pulmonologists; physiologists; chest, pulmonary, thoracic, and cardiovascular physicians and surgeons; asthmologists; cardiologists; respiratory therapists; and upper-level undergraduate, graduate, and medical school students in these disciplines.