Suppose you suffered a rib injury that inhibited your ability to take regular breaths due to the pain. If you? needed to maintain the same volume as you calculated in this activity, and your tidal volume was 0.2L due to the injury, what would your respiratory rate have to be?

To calculate minute ventilation (the volume of air breathed in per minute), you can use the formula:

Minute Ventilation (MV)=Tidal Volume (TV)×Respiratory Rate (RR)

Minute Ventilation (MV)=Tidal Volume (TV)×Respiratory Rate (RR)

Given that your tidal volume (TV) is 0.2 L

0.2L, and you want to maintain the same minute ventilation, you can rearrange the formula to solve for the respiratory rate (RR):

RR=Minute VentilationTidal Volume

RR=Tidal Volume

Minute Ventilation

​

Since you want to maintain the same minute ventilation, let's assume your normal minute ventilation is, for example, 6 L/min

6L/min (this is just a hypothetical value, and actual values may vary).

RR=6 L/min0.2 L

RR=0.2L

6L/min

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RR=30 breaths/min

RR=30breaths/min

So, if your tidal volume is reduced to 0.2 L

0.2L due to a rib injury, and you want to maintain the same minute ventilation as before, your respiratory rate would need to increase to 30 breaths/min

30breaths/min. This compensates for the decreased tidal volume by increasing the number of breaths per minute.

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