djmartinez

Hi all, I'm currently in the process of writing a paper for my advanced pharmacology class. I have to explain the pathophysiology of a patient from a case study who has sustained a spinal cord injury and is going into neurogenic shock. The patient has sustained a compression fracture at C5. He has decreased chest expansion, diminished breath sounds at the bases, increased abdominal exclusion with breathing, and a respiration rate of 28 and shallow. I'm having a problem explaining why he is expericing mild tachypnea. I know that neurogenic shock stops the SNS from working - leading to vasodilation and bradycardia, but isn't the SNS also responsible for increasing respirations? If the SNS increases RR but is impaired, shouldn't this patient be hypo ventilating? I've been looking at journal articles and websites and they're all saying that patient with neurogenic shock would have tachypnea but they don't explain 'why'. Can anyone help me out to explain the why? Thanks!

Hi all, I'm currently in the process of writing a paper for my advanced pharmacology class. I have to explain the pathophysiology of a patient from a case study who has sustained a spinal cord injury and is going into neurogenic shock. The patient has sustained a compression fracture at C5. He has decreased chest expansion, diminished breath sounds at the bases, increased abdominal exclusion with breathing, and a respiration rate of 28 and shallow. I'm having a problem explaining why he is expericing mild tachypnea. I know that neurogenic shock stops the SNS from working - leading to vasodilation and bradycardia, but isn't the SNS also responsible for increasing respirations? If the SNS increases RR but is impaired, shouldn't this patient be hypo ventilating? I've been looking at journal articles and websites and they're all saying that patient with neurogenic shock would have tachypnea but they don't explain 'why'. Can anyone help me out to explain the why? Thanks!