In 1995 the British Heart Journal published a study (Clark et al, 1995) done by researchers from the National Heart and Lung Institute in London. The breathing rate of all 88 heart patients at rest ranged from 10 to 18 l/min. This is about 2-3 times more than the norm: 6 l/min at rest for a 70-kg man.

In 2000 a study from the Chest magazine a group of American cardiac professionals revealed that patients with chronic heart failure had from 14 to 18 l/min (Johnson et al, 2000).

More recently, Greek doctors from the Onassis Cardiac Surgery Center in Athens recorded ventilation values ranging from 11 to 19 l/min for heart patients from their hospital (Dimopoulou et al, 2001).

Moreover, about a decade ago a group of 10 medical doctors published their findings, regarding breathing of heart patients, in the American Journal of Cardiology. These MDs conducted a hyperventilation provocation test with over 200 heart patients. Their patients were asked to hyperventilate. It was found that all patients experienced coronary artery spasms (Nakao et al, 1997). The title of their study was "Hyperventilation as a specific test for diagnosis of coronary artery spasm". The cause of the spasm was too low CO2 values in the blood due to over-breathing.

How can hyperventilation affect the heart? The main effects are due to CO2 deficiency.

* Low blood CO2 values lead to the narrowing of small blood vessels (spasm of arteries and arterioles) in the whole body. That causes two problems. First, as a group of Japanese medical professionals found, in conditions of CO2 deficiency, blood flow to the heart muscle decreases (Okazaki et al, 1991). Hence, heart tissue gets less oxygen, glucose and other nutrients. Second, since small blood vessels are the main contributors to the total resistance in relation to blood flow, CO2 deficiency increases resistance to blood flow and makes the work of the heart harder.

* The suppressed Bohr effect, due to low CO2 values in the blood, further reduces oxygenation of the heart muscle (oxygen cannot be efficiently released by red blood cells causing tissue hypoxia). Meanwhile, it is known that low oxygenation of the heart is the cause of the angina pain.

* The excited nerve cells in the heart (the cells that are called pacemakers) interfere with the normal synchronization and harmony in the working of the heart muscle. (The valves should open and close in proper time, much like a well-tuned engine.). Desynchronization can make the whole process of blood pumping less efficient or more energy- and oxygen-demanding.

* Abnormal metabolism of fats leads, as Russian medical studies revealed, to increased blood cholesterol level in some people. That condition gradually, over periods of weeks or months, produces cholesterol deposits on the walls of blood vessels in genetically predisposed people. Such deposits can induce primary hypertension. As Russian published studies suggest, the degree of overbreathing has a linear correlation with the blood cholesterol level.

* Mouth breathing (both at rest and during exercise) is an additional adverse stimulus present in most heart patients. It prevents normal absorption of nitric oxide (a hormone and powerful dilator of blood vessels) synthesized in the nasal passages.

Which parts of the cardiovascular system are going to be most affected?

That depends on genetic predisposition and environmental factors. There are so many factors that can affect the normal work of the cardiovascular system. People are different. Some may get chronic heart failure, others high blood pressure, or stroke, or various abnormalities in the heart muscle.

Therefore, it makes sense to claim that the heart disease is the disease of heavy breathers. It exists only in conditions of chronic hyperventilation. Heart patients breathe too heavy at rest, and even bigger during acute stages. If heart patients slow down and normalize their breathing rate, they would not experience their symptoms and do not require their medication. Currently, there is only one medical self-oxygenation therapy practiced by hundreds of health and medical practitioners in Russia and other countries. It is known as the Buteyko breathing method.