What Is Hyperpnea?

In hyperpnea, you take deeper breaths. Sometimes you may also breathe faster.

Hyperpnea is your body’s response to signals from your brain, blood vessels, and joints to adjust your breathing. Deeper breaths provide an increase in oxygen intake.

Hyperpnea can also be deliberately used as a calming technique or to help you improve your breathing if you have a lung-related disease.

Hyperpnea can occur as a normal response to your activity or environment, or it may be associated with disease.

Here are some of the situations involving hyperpnea:

• Exercise. Exercise or physical activity is the most frequent situation for hyperpnea. Your body automatically initiates the hyperpnea.
• High altitude. Hyperpnea can be a normal response to the need to increase your oxygen intake when you are at higher altitudes. If you’re hiking, skiing, or engaged in other activities at higher altitudes, you may need even more oxygen than at lower altitudes.
• Anemia. Anemia may be associated with hyperpnea because the blood has a decreased ability to transport oxygen.
• Cold air exposure. Exposure to cold temperatures outdoors or from air conditioning indoors can result in hyperpnea.
• Asthma. Asthma may involve hyperpnea as way of taking in more oxygen when you’re short of breath. A 2016 study showed that exercise training involving deliberate hyperpnea may help improve the lung and airway problems in asthma.
• Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). COPD may involve hyperpnea. A 2015 study of controlled hyperpnea suggested that it can improve the respiratory muscles of people with COPD.
• Metabolic acidosis. Acidosis involves the buildup of too much acid in your body’s fluids. Hyperpnea is a symptom.
• Panic disorder. Panic attacks may involve hyperpnea.

You automatically breathe more deeply during exercise or strenuous activity. However, the exact mechanism of hyperpnea during exercise has been the subject of much research.

There’s still controversy on how exercise and hyperpnea are related.

The debate revolves around how your body adjusts to the increased demand for oxygen during hyperpnea and exercise when there’s no change measured in your blood gas composition.

Does it result from a signal from your blood to your brain, or from muscle or brain sensors in advance of blood-borne signals? More research is needed to answer this question.

Hyperpnea during exercise or used deliberately to improve the condition of your lungs or to calm yourself isn’t dangerous.

But some people who exercise very strenuously, especially for long periods or in the cold, may develop bronchoconstriction. This condition causes your air passages to narrow.

Usually, bronchoconstriction goes away when you stop exercising. See your healthcare provider if this becomes chronic.

People with a lung condition, such as asthma, should take care that exercise doesn’t trigger bronchoconstriction.

Hyperpnea is usually normal and doesn’t require treatment.

Any treatment for hyperpnea depends on the underlying condition. If you have a heart condition, acidosis, or infection that is limiting the amount of oxygen you’re getting, your healthcare provider will treat that condition.

Hyperpnea is breathing more deeply but not necessarily faster. It happens when you exercise or when you’re doing something strenuous.

Hyperventilation is breathing very fast and deeply, and exhaling more air than you take in. This reduces the normal level of carbon dioxide in your body, causing lightheadedness and other symptoms.

Hyperventilation can occur under many conditions, including:

• stress
• panic or anxiety
• drug overdose
• lung diseases
• severe pain

If hyperventilation recurs, see your healthcare provider.

Hyperpnea is breathing more deeply and sometimes faster than usual. It’s normal during exercise or exertion.

Tachypnea is rapid, shallow breathing, when you take more than the normal amount of breaths per minute.

Tachypnea isn’t normal. If you’re experiencing tachypnea, you should seek medical help, especially if you have other symptoms, such as chest pain or lightheadedness.

Hyperpnea is breathing deeply, a normal response to exertion requiring more oxygen.

Hypopnea is the partial blockage of air when you’re sleeping. It often occurs with apnea, which is the total blockage of air when you’re sleeping.

In hypopnea, your airflow decreases for at least 10 seconds when you breathe, decreasing the amount of oxygen getting to your blood.

Seek treatment if you have symptoms of hypopnea.

Hyperpnea is breathing more deeply but not necessarily faster.

It’s a normal response to exercise or physical exertion in other activities, although the mechanism isn’t fully understood.

Hyperpnea can also result from an underlying medical condition that limits your body’s ability to take in oxygen. It can also occur when you’re in high altitudes.

Treatment for hyperpnea depends on the underlying condition. Talk to your doctor if you have concerns about hyperpnea.