Increased ventilatory variability and complexity in patients with hyperventilation disorder

It has been hypothesized but never proven that hyperventilation disorder results from an abnormality of respiratory control. We show that well-defined patients suffering from hyperventilation disorder (permanent hypocapnia during a cardiopulmonary exercise test) are characterized by increased variability of their resting ventilation due to increased ventilatory complexity with stable ventilatory-chemoresponsiveness interactions. We hypothesize that this submissive hypocapnia may be related to central nervous system sensitization.