Question

t turns out an asthma attack is caused by a misfire in biological feedback mechanisms that are entirely based on Le Chatelier’s Principle. Your task in this question is to explain why a common symptom reported by people having an asthma attack is that they feel a need to exhale even though what they actually need to do is inhale. The feeling that you need to exhale is triggered by a pH change in your blood. If your blood pH drops too far, you feel a need to exhale. In an asthma attack, the lungs are inflamed, and it becomes difficult to inhale so the lungs are being emptied out but not refilled. Explain why a common symptom is a feeling of a need to exhale.

Answer 1

During asthma there is spasms in the muscles of the airways due to excessive mucus which clogs the airway which makes the movement of air inside and outside of alveoli harder. Due to mucus the airway lining thickens which makes breathing harder. There is swelling in the muscles around the airways and they squeeze tightly in asthma hence it takes longer to exhale than to inhale. Since exhaling becomes tougher in asthma the more amount of air gets accumulated inside the lungs which leads to feeling of need to exhale more.