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#Medtwitter – can we eradicate this myth together, once and for all?
If you hear someone say, “if you can speak, you can breathe,” correct them. This is false, and has been used to perpetrate/excuse too many criminal deaths. #blm Today in @annalsofIM: 1/
https://bit.ly/3hWFPjP
If you hear someone say, “if you can speak, you can breathe,” correct them. This is false, and has been used to perpetrate/excuse too many criminal deaths. #blm Today in @annalsofIM: 1/
https://bit.ly/3hWFPjP
Only 50mL of air has to move over the vocal cords to generate a syllable (150ml for “I can’t breathe”) – a small volume of air that only fills your mouth/trachea (“dead space”) but not the alveoli of your lungs where air actually gets delivered to the rest of your body. 2/
To sustain life, you need way more air than that to make it into your alveoli – at least 4-5L/min when you’re relaxed and way more if your muscles are stressed (>100L/min). When your body doesn’t get those volumes, you can go into cardiopulmonary arrest. 3/
Where does this myth come from? 
But #medtwitter, we see the truth all the time clinically, like when people can have a brief intubation/GOC discussion when their pCO2 is sky high or pO2 is tanking. We KNOW people can speak and still be dying of respiratory failure. 4/
But #medtwitter, we see the truth all the time clinically, like when people can have a brief intubation/GOC discussion when their pCO2 is sky high or pO2 is tanking. We KNOW people can speak and still be dying of respiratory failure. 4/
So – EDUCATE people. Some people may just need the facts, others may be using this myth to excuse the use of excessive, fatal force. Nurses, doctors, RTs, first-responders – don’t let this be an excuse anymore. Spread, disseminate, educate. 5/
This piece was co-authored with @iwashyna and @garyweissman, with invaluable contributions from other members of the Pulmonary Critical Care Anti-Racism (PCARE) Working Group: @robertpdickson, @NidaQadirMD, @hopealuko, @walkeyallan, @MUCOPHILE, and Bob Banzett /fin #icantbreathe
