November Is National Lung Month
BREATHING
Breathing is something that we all do without usually realizing it. We breathe in and out about 22,000 times a day.
We are powered by breathing. Our lungs fuel us with oxygen, our body’s life-sustaining gas. Our lungs breathe in air, then remove the oxygen and pass it through our bloodstream, where it’s carried off to the tissues and organs that allow us to walk, talk, and move.
Our lungs also take carbon dioxide from our blood and released it into the air when we breathe out.
Our brain controls how fast our lungs draw in air. When we exercise or play, our brain tells our lungs to work faster. When we’re sleeping or at rest, our lungs slow down.
Our breathing and our lungs are precious. We need to protect them.
Here are a few fun facts about our breathing and lungs:
Your left and right lungs aren’t exactly the same. The lung on the left side of your body is divided into two lobes. The lung on your right side is divided into three. The left lung is also slightly smaller, allowing room for your heart.
Did you know that you can live with only one lung? Having just one lung limits your physical ability. However it doesn’t stop you from living a relatively normal life.
People who have a large lung capacity can send oxygen around their body faster. You can increase your lung capacity with regular exercise.
When resting, the average adult breathes around 12 to 20 times a minute.
Lungs contain approximately 2,400 kilometres of airways and 300 to 500 million air sacs (alveoli).
If stretched out, the total surface area of lungs would equal about the size as half a tennis court.
There are about 600 million lung sacs (alveoli) in your lungs. If you stretched all of them out, they would be about the size of four and a half 18-wheelers parked next to each other.
Your lungs are important for talking and singing. Above your trachea (wind pipe) is your larynx (your voice box), which contains your vocal cords. The amount of air you force through them can change the pitch of the sound and also changes the volume of the sound.
HOW YOUR LUNGS WORK
Your lungs bring fresh oxygen into your body. They remove the carbon dioxide and other waste gases that your body doesn’t need.
To breathe in (inhale), you use the muscles of your rib cage – especially the major muscle, the diaphragm. Your diaphragm tightens and flattens, allowing you to suck air into your lungs. To breathe out (exhale), your diaphragm and rib cage muscles relax. This naturally lets the air out of your lungs.
To get the oxygen your body needs, you inhale air through your mouth and nose. The mucous membranes in your mouth and nose warm and moisten the air, and trap particles of foreign matter (like dirt and dust). The air passes through the throat into the trachea (windpipe). The trachea divides into the left and right bronchi. Like a branch, each bronchus divides again and again, becoming narrower and narrower.
Your smallest airways end in the alveoli, small, thin air sacs that are arranged in clusters like bunches of balloons. When you breathe in by enlarging the chest cage, the “balloons” expand as air rushes in to fill the vacuum. When you breathe out, the “balloons” relax and air moves out of the lungs.
Tiny blood vessels surround each of the 300 million alveoli in the lungs. Oxygen moves across the walls of the air sacs, is picked up by the blood and carried to the rest of the body. Carbon dioxide or waste gas passes into the air sacs from the blood and is breathed out.
RESPIRATORY SYSTEM
Breathing is the process that brings oxygen in the air into your lungs and moves oxygen through your body. Our lungs remove the oxygen and pass it through our bloodstream, where it’s carried off to the tissues and organs that allow us to walk, talk, and move. Our lungs also take carbon dioxide from our blood and release it into the air when we breathe out.
The SINUSES are hollow spaces in the bones of your head. Small openings connect them to the nasal cavity. The sinuses help to regulate the temperature and humidity of air you breathe in, as well as to lighten the bone structure of the head and to give tone to your voice.
The NASAL CAVITY (nose) is the best entrance for outside air into your respiratory system. The hairs that line the inside wall are part of the air-cleansing system.
Air can also enter through your ORAL CAVITY (mouth), especially if you have a mouth-breathing habit or your nasal passages may be temporarily blocked.
The ADENOIDS are overgrown lymph tissue at the top of the throat. When your adenoids interfere with your breathing, they are sometimes removed. The lymph system, consisting of nodes (knots of cells) and connecting vessels, carries fluid throughout the body. This system helps your body resist infection by filtering out foreign matter, including germs, and producing cells (lymphocytes) to fight them.
The TONSILS are lymph nodes in the wall of your pharynx. Tonsils are not an important part of the germ-fighting system of the body. If they become infected, they are sometimes removed.
The PHARYNX (throat) collects incoming air from your nose and passes it downward to your trachea (windpipe).
The EPIGLOTTIS is a flap of tissue that guards the entrance to your trachea. It closes when anything is swallowed that should go into the esophagus and stomach.
The LARYNX (voice box) contains your vocal cords. When moving air is breathed in and out, it creates voice sounds.
The ESOPHAGUS is the passage leading from your mouth and throat to your stomach.
The TRACHEA (windpipe) is the passage leading from your pharynx to the lungs.
The RIBS are bones supporting and protecting your chest cavity. They move a small amount and help the lungs to expand and contract.
The trachea divides into the two main BRONCHI (tubes), one for each lung. The bronchi, in turn, subdivide further into bronchioles.
The RIGHT LUNG is divided into three LOBES, or sections.
The left lung is divided into two LOBES.
The PLEURA are the two membranes that surround each lobe of your lungs and separate the lungs from your chest wall.
The bronchial tubes are lined with CILIA (like very small hairs) that have a wave-like motion. This motion carries MUCOUS (sticky phlegm or liquid) upward and out into the throat, where it is either coughed up or swallowed. The mucous catches and holds much of the dust, germs, and other unwanted matter that has invaded your lungs. Your lungs get rid of the mucous through coughing.
The DIAPHRAGM is the strong wall of muscle that separates your chest cavity from your abdominal cavity. By moving downward, it creates suction to draw in air and expand the lungs.
The smallest section of the bronchi are called BRONCHIOLES, at the end of which are the alveoli (plural of alveolus).
The ALVEOLI are the very small air sacs that are the destination of air that you breathe in. The CAPILLARIES are blood vessels that are imbedded in the walls of the alveoli. Blood passes through the capillaries, brought to them by the PULMONARY ARTERY and taken away by the PULMONARY VEIN. While in the capillaries, the blood moves carbon dioxide into the alveoli and takes up oxygen from the air in the alveoli.
THE IMPACT OF LUNG DISEASE
The burden of lung disease is heavy in Canada. In particular, lung cancer, asthma and COPD exact an enormous human and economic toll. In 2014, lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death for both men and women, causing more cancer deaths among Canadians than breast, colorectal and prostate cancer combined.
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Source: The Lung Association
