1 The Department of Pediatrics, University of Kansas Medical School, Kansas City, Kan.
Five percent carbon dioxide added to 20% oxygen is a more powerful stimulus to respiration of healthy fullterm infants than is 100% oxygen. Fullterm infants hypoventilating as a result of exposure to low concentrations of oxygen had their minute volumes restored more rapidly and to a greater extent when 5% carbon dioxide was added to oxygen concentrations varying from 12 to 95% than when 100% oxygen was administered.
The age of the infant appeared to have but slight effect on the response made to breathing 5% carbon dioxide or 100% oxygen. Infants under two or three hours of age were not tested.
The value of adding carbon dioxide to air or oxygen in the treatment of "asphyxia neonatorum" has been discussed. Too little is known concerning the chemical, physiologic and anatomic changes occurring in this loosely termed condition or even in healthy newborn infants to warrant a pessimistic attitude towards the use of 5% carbon dioxide added to air or oxygen in the treatment of newborn infants with respiratory insufficiency.
Submitted on November 24, 1953
This article has been cited by other articles:
![]() |
A. Khan, M. Qurashi, K. Kwiatkowski, D. Cates, and H. Rigatto Measurement of the CO2 apneic threshold in newborn infants: possible relevance for periodic breathing and apnea J Appl Physiol, April 1, 2005; 98(4): 1171 - 1176. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] |
||||