Lung capacity

“ This great lung capacity is in itself a great source of health, vim, energy, and power. It means the power to take in a larger supply of oxygen to purify and vivify the blood. Half the people of our cities do not know what real true life is, because their blood is not well enough oxygenated. The people who are full of life and exuberance and power—the men and women who accomplish things—generally have large lung capacity, or else have the faculty of using all they have to the best advantage. ”

“ The respiratory capacity of a person does not depend on the absolute volume of the throat, but on the extent to which its volume increases between expiration and inspiration. The lung is the slave of the thoracic wall, and follows it in all its movements. ”

“ The average person uses only about one seventh of his lung capacity in ordinary breathing, the rest of the air remaining at the bottom of the lung, being termed 'residual.' As this is vitiated by its stay in the lung, it does harm rather than good by its presence.... ”

“ It will be observed that smokers of the same age as non-smokers and 3.3 pounds heavier have a lung capacity of 22.6 cubic inches (7.3 per cent.) smaller. Inasmuch as the smokers are heavier than the non-smokers by 3.3 pounds, their lung capacity should, from the standpoint of averages, be correspondingly greater. ”

“ The boys have greater lung capacity than the girls, on an average, for all periods except at about 13 and 1312 years of age. The development in lung capacity for girls about comes to a standstill or decreases after 15 years of age; for boys the period is some time after 17 or 18. Marked arrests in height and weight are uniformly accompanied by arrest in growth of lung capacity. ”

“ The lungs are the organs of respiration. They are two in number, the right and the left. The right lung possesses three distinct chambers, and the left lung is made up of two. The average adult has a lung capacity, in round numbers, of three hundred and fifty cubic inches, and uses about thirty cubic inches for an ordinary inhalation and exhalation, although it would be well if he used forty, or even fifty, cubic inches of his capacity. There are one hundred cubic inches of air always in the lungs of an adult which cannot be forced out by physical exertion and the human animal live. ”

“ On rising, drink two glasses of water, eat a little of some juicy fruit, and devote as much time as possible to vigorous deep breathing exercises before dressing. In taking these movements, inflate the lungs to their fullest capacity, and hold the breath for half a minute while executing one or two movements. In this way the cell capacity of the lungs can, in many instances, be doubled. Large lung capacity is of primary importance in cases of nervousness. ”

“ Breathing by the lungs is simply the means by which the taking up of oxygen and the giving off of carbon dioxide by the cells is made possible.
HYGIENE OF RESPIRATORY ORGANS The liability of the lungs to attacks from such dread diseases as consumption and pneumonia makes questions touching their hygiene of first importance. Consumption does not as a rule attack sound lung tissue, but usually has its beginning in some weak or enfeebled spot in the lungs which has lost its "power of resistance." ”

“ Absolutely, the lungs may contain no more air than they should in health—they may even contain less—but, relatively, there is an increased amount of air in them in consequence of the diminished amount of the lung-tissue. Such relative increase of air in a given area of the lung may be very considerable from the atrophy and destruction of the cell-walls, the alveoli coalescing so as to form cavities, while the individual air-cells are not dilated. The entire lung, however, is shrunken, the chest-wall correspondingly depressed and contracted, and the thoracic muscles atrophied. ”

“ If the lung action is inadequate, if deep breathing in fresh air is not practiced, or if, through laziness, no exercise is taken, then the amount of oxygen supplied will be deficient and the body will be loaded up with the toxic products resulting from decomposition. The exact effect of exercise upon the lung action may be seen from the fact that under ordinary circumstances a man breathes about 480 cubic inches of air per minute. ”

“ Imperfect breathing allows a considerable part of the lungs to remain inactive, and such portions offer an inviting field for bacilli, which invading the weakened tissue soon produce havoc. Good, healthy lung tissue will resist the germs, and the only way to have good, healthy lung tissue is to use the lungs properly. ”

“ Superficial Examination of Thorax.—Observe the position, color, and degree of distention of the lungs. It should be remembered that healthy lungs, as soon as the chest is opened, owing to their inherent elasticity, will collapse, and when this normal collapse is not seen it is generally due to a loss of elasticity as occurs in emphysema, to inflammatory diseases binding the lung to the chest wall, or to the alveoli being filled with solid or fluid substances or pent-up air. Most complete distention is seen when death is due to drowning or suffocation. ”

“ It follows, therefore, that no one can be well nourished who has not a full, free, and unimpeded action of the lungs. In the contracted chest, the external measurement is reduced one half; but as the upper portions of the lungs cannot be fully inflated until the lower portions are fully expanded, it follows that the breathing capacity is diminished more than one half. It is wonderful how anyone can endure existence, or long survive, in this devitalized condition; yet, thousands do, and with careful nursing, manage to bring into the world several sickly children. ”

“ With the access of the hot stage the characteristic symptoms of lung disease are manifested, at first resembling those of congested lungs, but less severe than those given under that head. There is a distinct increase of the body temperature; the visible mucous membranes are suffused with a blush; the expired air feels hot upon the hand; the breathing, 30 to 40 per minute, is short and accompanied by much lifting of the flanks— (labored) ; the cough is deep as if coming from the depth of the chest, but not so hard nor so painful as in bronchitis ”

“ The unexpanded lungs are brownish-red, firm in consistence and distinctly lobulated. Air-containing lung floats in water and crepitates, and gives off bubbles when cut beneath the water. Attempts at artificial respiration may draw some air into the lungs. Gas-bubbles may be produced by decomposition. In white pneumonia the lung is pale, grayish-white and airless. The larynx, trachea and bronchi are to be examined for presence of mucus, [Pg 185] amniotic fluid, meconium, foreign substances, etc. ”

“ If the patient is breathing from twenty-five to thirty-five times per minute, the respiration being confined to one lung as indicated by the lack of expansion in the other, and if he lies so as to take the strain off the lung that does not expand, it is almost sure that the patient has pneumonia. In case the lung is fixed rigidly by the muscles and the opposite lung forced to do all the work, then the patient has pleurisy. ”

“ As the exhausted capacity as well as impleted capacity of the internal organs of respiration must be different in different individuals, [Pg 411] according as the forms and size of their thorax, fauces, and bronchia are different, it would be almost useless to endeavour to ascertain a standard capacity. It is however probable, that a ratio exists between the quantities of air inspired in the natural and forced inspiration, those expired in the natural and forced expiration, and the whole capacity of the lungs. ”

“ Another mode in which violent effort injures the lungs is by the rapid and continued inhalation of great quantities of air during rapid breathing, so as to dilate the lungs suddenly to their fullest extent. Sometimes from irregular distribution of the ærial current or from the want of tone in a particular part of the lung that gives way under the pressure and the air cells become overdistended or ruptured. ”

“ It is remarkable how many of our disease-enemies appear to have a preference for the lung as a point of attack. In the language of Old Man Means in "The Hoosier Schoolmaster," the lung is "their fav'rit holt." Our deadliest diseases are lung diseases, headed by consumption, seconded by pneumonia, and followed by bronchitis, asthma, etc.; together, they manage to account for one-fourth to one-third of all the deaths that occur in a community, young or old. No other great organ or system of the body is responsible for more than half such a mortality. ”

“ Simple diffusion through the narrow bronchial tubes could not possibly bring oxygen into the lung sacs fast enough to supply the requirements of the blood flowing through their walls. The situation is met by active lung ventilation; that is, by forcibly changing the air in the lungs at frequent intervals. The way in which this is done is, as we all know, by breathing. Breathing is nothing but a bellows movement of the chest by which air is alternately expelled and allowed to enter. ”

“ Hypostatic congestion of the lungs is accompanied by copious, watery, blood-stained expectoration. In pneumonia the sputa, though bloody, are rarely watery. Pneumonia occurs anywhere in the lung, and has well-marked rational symptoms; hypostatic congestion occurs in the most dependent portion of the lung, disappears when the patient sits up, is accompanied by no rational symptoms except dyspnoea and expectoration, and usually can be traced to a long-continued recumbent posture in those who are suffering from extensive blood-changes. ”

“ Chronic obstructive lung diseases afflict an estimated 17.2 million Americans, with more than three million being disabled to a greater or lesser degree by such disorders as chronic bronchitis, asthma, and emphysema and many other serious lung diseases of known and unknown causes. ”

“ Violent and serious as are the changes in the lung, it is very seldom that death comes by interference with the breathing space. In fact, while regarded as a lung disease, we are now coming to recognize that the actual cause of death in fatal cases is the overwhelming of the heart by the toxins or poisons poured into the circulation from the affected lung. The mode of treatment is, therefore, to support the strength of the patient in every way, and measures directed to the affected lung are assuming less and less importance in our arsenal of remedies. ”

“ The lung follows the heart. The whole mediastinum finds itself altered in its position and in its contents. The depressed diaphragm rises promptly to its old position in the pleural cavity. The liver, spleen, and the rib-wall undergo striking modifications. We do not expect the lung to dilate to its full extent, as after aspirations in simple pleurisies. The lung, indeed, is already impaired in its movement. We admit air in order to secure treatment to these surfaces. When air is admitted into the normal chest, the lung is retracted to about one-half its size. ”

“ But however much the lungs vary in capacity, or the heart as to position in the respiratory motions, still the lungs are always closely applied to the thoracic walls. Between the pleura costalis and pulmonalis there occurs no interval in health. The thoracic parietes expand and contract to a certain degree; and to that same degree, and no further, do the lungs within the thorax expand and contract. By no effort of expiration can the animal expel all the air completely from its lungs, since by no effort of its own, can it contract thoracic space beyond the natural limit. ”

“ But sometimes, from the extent of the congestion, respiration is interrupted to such a degree that life is quickly destroyed. In such cases the affected portion of the lung is of a dark color from being engorged with blood, which flows from it if an incision is made. The part is heavier and crepitates less than normal lung-tissue. The bronchial mucous membrane is apt to be hyperæmic, as might be expected from the communication that exists between the pulmonary and bronchial vessels, and the tubes themselves are filled with mucus and sometimes with frothy and bloody serum. ”

“ Though the emphysematous lung is distended to a size equal to the healthy lung in deep inspiration, yet we know that emphysematous distention, being produced by extrabronchial air accumulation, is, in fact, obstructive to the respiratory act. ”

“ The greatest living authorities on lung-diseases pronounce deficient ventilation the chief cause of consumption, and more fatal than all other causes put together; and, even where food and clothing are both unwholesome, free air has been found able to counteract their effect.
In the country the balance ordained in nature has its compensating power. The poisonous carbonic acid thrown off by lungs and body is absorbed by vegetation whose food it is, and which in every waving leaf or blade of grass returns to us the oxygen we demand. ”

“ Many of these disorders are presently incurable, but often much can be done to relieve their symptoms and to enable resumption of a reasonably normal existence despite lung conditions that formerly would have made the victim a respiratory cripple. In other situations, the patient whose life is threatened by acute respiratory failure can be restored to health if the lungs can be given a temporary respite while the patient battles back from a potentially lethal injury or illness. ”

“ In pneumonia or inflammation of the lung-substance the process is different. A portion of one or other lung, sometimes of both, becomes overfilled with blood, or congested, and though the air-tubes themselves are not the special seat of the congestion, yet the air-cells are pressed on by the surrounding swollen substance, and the entrance of air into them is impeded. If the mischief goes further the substance becomes solid and impervious to air, and lastly it becomes softened, its structure destroyed, and infiltrated with matter ”