Anouk: Hi! I am Anouk from Voorhees New Jersey, why cant a person with COPD take a deep breath.
Paul Scanlon: Thank you Anouk, that's a very good question. Lung mechanics, this is the advanced physiology that drives medical students crazy but it's an important question. What happens to the lungs in COPD?
The lungs in COPD develop obstruction in the air ways. So you can think of your lungs like a tree the broncule tubes, the trachea and the bronclue tubes are like the trunk and the branches and the alveoli, the air sacs in the lungs are like the leaves. And what happens in COPD, is that air flow is reduced if you think of air flow it's kind of like stepping on your garden hose, there is plenty of air in there but it cant get out because it's obstructed, that's what happens the broncule tube become obstructed and you cant get the air out and it makes sense to think about that the why isn't that just make it hard to breathe out.
In order to breathe out you tend to breathe a fuller lung volumes and because you are breathing at fuller lung volumes you have to work harder to take a deep breathe. So people with obstructive lungs disease, both COPD and Asthma have the perception it's not only hard to breathe out it's hard to breathe in, the work of breathing in general is increased.
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