respiration
/rɛspɪˈreɪʃ(ə)n
/noun [mass noun]
1The action of breathing: opiates affect respiration...
- Every aspect of life depends on muscular activity, whether it be speech, eating and digestion, respiration, all expressions of brain function.
- Blood pressure and respiration are checked every five minutes, and the patient's temperature also is recorded.
- The effects of sleep on respiration include changes in central respiratory control, airways resistance, and muscular contractility.
1.1 [count noun] chiefly Medicine A single breath: observation of the patient’s respirations will gradually be decreased...
- Before and after each administration of salmeterol or placebo, patients were assessed for heart rate, respirations, and breath sounds.
- In the respiratory form, sinus arrhythmia typically varies with respirations, and the heart rate (RR interval) increases with inspiration and decreases with expiration.
- By using opiate analgesics and sedatives to provide comfort to a dying patient, we risk depressing respirations and causing hypotension, which may hasten death.
1.2 Biology A process in living organisms involving the production of energy, typically with the intake of oxygen and the release of carbon dioxide from the oxidation of complex organic substances.Temporal relationships between organic carbon production and respiration are not well understood in coral reef ecosystems....
- Root respiration provides metabolic energy for growth and maintenance of root biomass and for ion transport.
- First, and most obvious, there is the role of respiration in energy metabolism.
Origin
Late Middle English: from Latin respiratio(n-), from respirare 'breathe out' (see respire).