Claudication refers to muscle pain due to lack of oxygen that's triggered by activity and relieved by rest. Symptoms include the following: Pain, ache, discomfort or fatigue in muscles every time those muscles are used.
Dizziness/lightheadedness: Feeling faint or dizzy is one of the most common indicators your body is not getting the oxygen it needs. Rapid, shallow breathing: When your body is not receiving sufficient oxygen, it can make you feel like your lungs are not getting enough air and can cause you to start breathing quickly.
In severe cases of anoxia and hypoxia, from any cause, the patient is often stuperous or comatose (in a state of unconsciousness) for periods ranging from hours to days, weeks, or months. Seizures, myoclonic jerks (muscle spasms or twitches), and neck stiffness may occur.
Hypoxemic Hypoxia
Low oxygen tension in the arterial blood (PaO2) is due to the inability of the lungs to properly oxygenate the blood. Causes include hypoventilation, impaired alveolar diffusion, and pulmonary shunting.
If you have a health condition that causes low levels of oxygen in your blood (hypoxia), you may feel breathless and tired, particularly after walking or coughing. Fluid may also build up around your ankles (oedema) and you may have blue lips (cyanosis).
Less oxygen in the air you breathe, such as at high altitudes. Breathing that's too slow or shallow to meet the lungs' need for oxygen. Either not enough blood flow to the lungs or not enough oxygen to the lungs.
Muscle cells can continue to produce ATP when oxygen runs low using lactic acid fermentation. However, this often results in muscle fatigue and pain.
Hypoxemia. Chronic hypoxia may be linked with muscle wasting and weakness.
Hypoxia: Muscle blood flow, hypoxia, and hypoperfusion - PMC.
Early signs of hypoxia are anxiety, confusion, and restlessness; if hypoxia is not corrected, hypotension will develop. As hypoxia worsens, the patient's vital signs, activity tolerance, and level of consciousness will decrease.
The carotid body senses oxygen in acute hypoxia, and produces appropriate responses such as increases in breathing, replenishing oxygen from air. How this oxygen is sensed at a relatively high level (arterial PO2 approximately 50 Torr) which would not be perceptible by other cells in the body, is a mystery.
Between 30-180 seconds of oxygen deprivation, you may lose consciousness. At the one-minute mark, brain cells begin dying. At three minutes, neurons suffer more extensive damage, and lasting brain damage becomes more likely. At five minutes, death becomes imminent.
Most people will die within 10 minutes of total oxygen deprivation. Those in poor health often die much sooner. Some people may suffer other medical catastrophes, such as a heart attack, in response to oxygen deprivation.
Computed Tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) can show if there is brain swelling and give an indication of the degree of damage to the brain and the areas affected.
Muscle weakness is commonly due to lack of exercise, ageing, muscle injury or pregnancy. It can also occur with long-term conditions such as diabetes or heart disease. There are many other possible causes, which include stroke, multiple sclerosis, depression, fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome (ME).
When your body doesn't have enough oxygen, you could get hypoxemia or hypoxia. These are dangerous conditions. Without oxygen, your brain, liver, and other organs can be damaged just minutes after symptoms start.
The lungs bring oxygen into the body, to provide energy, and remove carbon dioxide, the waste product created when you produce energy. The heart pumps the oxygen to the muscles that are doing the exercise.
Muscles require adenosine triphosphate (ATP) to function. Slow-twitch (red) muscle fibers have high levels of mitochondria and thus use oxidative phosphorylation to make ATP. However, this means that high concentrations of oxygen are required to generate the large amounts of ATP muscle cells need.
One of the important roles of blood flow is to provide O2 to the working muscles. It has been well documented that decreased oxygen availability to exercising muscle has profound consequences on muscle fatigue.
People over 70 years of age may have oxygen levels closer to 95%. Normal oxygen saturation levels (SpO2) are between 95 to 100 percent for both adults and children. Oxygen saturation levels below 95% are considered abnormal, and the brain may be affected when SpO2 levels drop below 80 to 85 percent.
Basic life support systems are often necessary. People with severe hypoxia may need a machine known as a ventilator to breathe for them. Other treatments include: blood, fluids, and medications to restore blood pressure and heart rate.