The agony of agonal respiration: is the last gasp necessary?

The agony of agonal respiration: is the last gasp necessary?

Gasping respiration in the dying patient is the last respiratory pattern prior to terminal apnoea. The duration of the gasping respiration phase varies; it may be as brief as one or two breaths to a prolonged period of gasping lasting minutes or even hours. Gasping respiration is very abnormal, easy to recognise and distinguish from other respiratory patterns and, in the dying patient who has e...

Patterns of respiration in diving penguins: is the last gasp an inspired tactic?

Humboldt penguins Spheniscus humboldti in captivity and free-living Magellanic penguins S. magellanicus were fitted with loggers to determine beak angles during breathing. The Humboldt penguins were also fitted with masks for determining rates of air flow during breathing. During periods of higher gas exchange requirement, Humboldt penguins opened their beaks during inspiration, where tidal vol...

The Last Gasp

of opportunity was, however, also a period of intense competition. Cotton’s river inter-linking scheme was double edged; it had to draw capital investments for navigation and irrigation schemes while simultaneously starving the same for the railways, which was then being touted as the most viable mode for mass transport in India. Cotton, in effect, wanted river navigation to trump railway lines...

Response to Kuhse.

In this short paper, we respond to critics of our original paper, The agony of agonal respiration: is the last gasp necessary?. A common thread in both Hawryluck's and Kuhse's responses is the difficulties encountered when using the agent's intentions to make moral distinctions between using neuromuscular blocking drugs to palliate versus using neuromuscular blocking drugs to kill. Although thi...

The Last Gasp Ii: Lungs and Thorax