Is oxygen more refreshing than coffee? Some people tried it and found that...

There is a popular saying on the Internet these days, that is, "inhaling oxygen can refresh you like drinking coffee." Is this true? Is it possible to endanger your health? Let's discuss it today.

First, the conclusion:

Healthy people don't need to breathe oxygen normally, and there is no special benefit from doing so.

Buying a bottle of oxygen and breathing it occasionally will not cause oxygen poisoning.

If you do find that "oxygen breathing really works wonders", then what you need most right now is probably not an oxygen tank...

Do we really need supplemental oxygen?

It is impossible for a human to live without oxygen for even a moment. An average person will feel very uncomfortable if they hold their breath for one or two minutes at most. If the brain is deprived of oxygen for four minutes, the nervous system will suffer irreversible damage, and prolonged suffocation will lead to death. It can be said that oxygen is the source of life.

Normally, the atmosphere around us contains about 21% oxygen, which varies depending on altitude and other conditions. We humans are adaptable, and in order to maintain the appropriate blood oxygen concentration, the body will make many adjustments on its own.

For example, as we all know, when we run, oxygen consumption increases, and we become breathless and short of breath, which increases the air intake so that oxygen can be supplied. When living in a plateau for a long time, the number of red blood cells in the body will also increase to better supply oxygen. This adaptability allows us to adapt to a wider range of oxygen content. In terms of volume percentage, we have no problem with oxygen content from 19.5% to 23.5%.

Image source: pixabay.com

Therefore, ordinary healthy people, as long as they do not go to plateaus or climb snow-capped mountains, are not prone to hypoxia and naturally do not need additional oxygen.

Oxygen inhalation is often required because of problems with the body's oxygen supply, such as suffocation or respiratory system disease caused by accidents, poisoning, or illness, which can lead to poor ventilation, insufficient gas exchange, and decreased oxygen-carrying capacity of red blood cells.

Some friends may still insist that oxygen inhalation does refresh them. Of course, we should respect everyone's feelings, but we also need to explore the reasons behind it.

One of them is the often mentioned placebo effect. We take a breath of oxygen and then feel a little more refreshed, but this does not necessarily mean that it is caused by the oxygen inhalation. It is likely just a psychological effect. Stretching and taking a few deep breaths may also have a good effect. To really figure out what is going on, we need to conduct single-blind or double-blind experiments, establish models to evaluate the changes in the subjects' states, and design other controls, etc. As far as current research is concerned, there is no reliable evidence to prove that oxygen inhalation has any health benefits.

However, in some cases, it may be true that you feel "more energetic" after breathing oxygen. We will talk about this later.

Can oxygen inhalation cause poisoning?

Regarding oxygen inhalation, many people are worried about oxygen poisoning - oxygen can indeed cause poisoning under certain conditions, but this is far from the lives of ordinary people. Because generally acute oxygen poisoning often occurs in the following scenarios:

①Mistakes in hyperbaric oxygen chamber treatment (such as premature infants or patients with cardiopulmonary diseases, etc.)

②A professional diver has an accident

③ Improper parameter settings or too long duration during oxygen therapy

To sum up, either the oxygen pressure is very high, or large amounts of oxygen are inhaled for a long time (for example, oxygen therapy at home often requires more than ten hours of oxygen inhalation).

There is another situation. Some friends, after living in the plateau for a period of time, suddenly return to the plains and will experience symptoms such as dizziness, fatigue, chest tightness and weakness. This is the so-called "oxygen intoxication", also known as "plateau deadaptation syndrome" . This is mainly because the number of red blood cells in the body increases on the plateau, and as a result, the oxygen content increases when returning to the plains, but the number of red blood cells has not returned, resulting in "excessive oxygen supply". However, this also takes a long time, and it will not appear after a few breaths of oxygen.

Image source: pixabay.com

Let's take a look at the small oxygen tanks that we can usually buy online. According to the instructions of these small oxygen tanks, if you inhale oxygen for one second each time, you can usually use it less than 200 times. With this capacity and if you inhale twice occasionally, the possibility of acute poisoning can be ignored. It should be noted that some people may have listened to some irresponsible propaganda and used an oxygen concentrator to inhale large amounts of oxygen for a long time. This situation may indeed lead to health risks.

If oxygen inhalation "really works"

These may be the reasons

Some friends may really think that oxygen inhalation has immediate effects, but they may need to be careful, because this may mean that there is something wrong with their health or environment...

On the one hand, as mentioned above, many diseases may affect the body's oxygen supply and cause discomfort. In this case, oxygen inhalation will certainly improve the condition. However, people who inhale oxygen often feel physical discomfort at ordinary times. Such friends should consult a doctor in time.

On the other hand, let's focus on environmental factors. The environment in which we work and live is sometimes narrow and crowded, with poor air circulation, which can easily make people tired and feel "stuffy".

This is not because of lack of oxygen, because the oxygen content in the air is not low, and we can only consume a small part of it when we breathe. Someone once did a simulation and found that even if the doors and windows were sealed with tape, and 7 people were squeezed into a 34.5-square-meter room to work for a day, the oxygen content in the indoor air was only reduced by 0.3%, which is completely tolerable for people.

The real reason for our discomfort is not less oxygen, but more carbon dioxide. Although healthy people have a strong tolerance to carbon dioxide, after all, physical fitness varies from person to person. For very sensitive people (such as asthma patients), a slightly higher concentration of carbon dioxide will cause some discomfort. The ideal range is 900~1800 mg/m3. According to the "Indoor Air Quality Standard (GB/T 18883-2022)", the indoor carbon dioxide concentration should not exceed 0.1%, which is about 2000 mg/m3.

So what is the concentration of carbon dioxide in our room? Someone has done statistics on this, and the results are as follows:

Image source: Reference [1]

As can be seen from the figure, the carbon dioxide concentration in some places is indeed quite high, and in some places it is even twice the upper limit of the standard, which may cause discomfort to more sensitive people. A 2019 study also showed that students are more likely to get tired when studying in a classroom with excessive carbon dioxide, and girls are more likely to get tired than boys.

In this case, breathing oxygen may indeed make you feel better, after all, one of the treatments for carbon dioxide poisoning is breathing oxygen. But this is not because oxygen can refresh you, but because the environment is simply unhealthy!

In this case, there is no need to rely on oxygen tanks to "refresh and prolong life". Opening windows frequently for ventilation can reduce the concentration of carbon dioxide on the one hand, and prevent respiratory infectious diseases on the other hand. It is convenient and saves money. Why not do it?

Finally, although it is unlikely that we will be poisoned by taking a few breaths of oxygen occasionally, oxygen tanks still have some fire-fighting risks. Moreover, oxygen is divided into medical oxygen and industrial oxygen. If criminals use industrial oxygen for people to breathe, the person who breathes oxygen may be poisoned by inhaling uncleaned exhaust gas.

Therefore, on the whole, medical means should be used on patients. Oxygen inhalation is of little use to healthy people and may even bring additional risks. If we want to stay energetic, we might as well open windows more often to ventilate and go to the park to exercise regularly.

References

[1] Liu Jianguo, Liu Yang. Evaluation function and evaluation criteria of CO2 in indoor air[J]. Journal of Environment and Health, 2005. DOI:CNKI:SUN:HJYJ.0.2005-04-031.

[2] Lin Xiao, Ji Xiaoqian, Guo Jinqing, et al. Study on the impact of classroom CO2 pollution level on student fatigue[J]. Modern Preventive Medicine, 2019, 46(20):5. DOI:CNKI:SUN:XDYF.0.2019-20-007.

[3] Indoor Air Quality Standard (GB/T 18883-2022)

Planning and production

Author: Dingzhong Popular Science Writer

Reviewer: Tang Qin, Director and Researcher of the Science Popularization Department of the Chinese Medical Association

Planning丨Ding Zong

Editor: Ding Zong