The effect of anemia on the ventilatory response to transient and steady-state hypoxia

The effects of anemia upon the ventilatory responses to transient and steady-state hypoxia were studied in unanesthetized goats. Responses to transient hypoxia (inhalation of several breaths of nitrogen) were considered to reflect peripheral chemoreceptor and non-chemoreceptor influences of hypoxia upon ventilatory control. In all goats, severe anemia (hemoglobin 3.1-4.8 g/100ml) markedly heightened the responses to transient hypoxia (from a mean of 0.27 to a mean of 0.75 liter/min/percent fall in SaO2). This phenomenon was substantially reversed by alpha-adrenergic blockade (phenoxybenzamine, 5 mg/kg). In contrast, the ventilatory responses to steady-state hypoxia were unaffected by severe anemia. These data suggest that severe anemia enhances the peripheral chemoreceptor-mediated response to hypoxia through a mechanism involving the alpha-adrenergic system. It also appears that a ventilatory depressant effect of hypoxia which is not mediated by the peripheral chemoreceptors is also enhanced by severe anemia, thereby preventing an increase in the steady-state ventilatory response to hypoxia. Finally, experiments involving variation in oxygen affinity of hemoglobin suggested that O2 tension rather than O2 availability in arterial blood is the major determinant of peripheral chemoreceptor activity.