Internal medicine

Hypoxemia

Disease

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Infectious disease (medical specialty)

Outbreak

Cardiology

Intensive care medicine

Virology

Betacoronavirus

2019-20 coronavirus outbreak

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)

Medicine

American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine

Patients with coronavirus disease (COVID-19) are described as exhibiting oxygen levels incompatible with life without dyspnea. The pairing-dubbed happy hypoxia but more precisely termed silent hypoxemia-is especially bewildering to physicians and is considered as defying basic biology. This combination has attracted extensive coverage in media but has not been discussed in medical journals. It is possible that coronavirus has an idiosyncratic action on receptors involved in chemosensitivity to oxygen, but well-established pathophysiological mechanisms can account for most, if not all, cases of silent hypoxemia. These mechanisms include the way dyspnea and the respiratory centers respond to low levels of oxygen, the way the prevailing carbon dioxide tension (Pa

Why COVID-19 Silent Hypoxemia Is Baffling to Physicians