Hyperventilation

//ˌhaɪpɚˌvɛntəˈleɪʃən// noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The state of breathing faster or deeper than necessary. countable, uncountable

    "As artificial hyperventilation is advocated in the treatment of raised intracranial pressure, it must be questioned where to set the limit beyond which hypocapnically induced cerebral tissue hypoxia may occur."

  2. 2
    an increased depth and rate of breathing greater than demanded by the body needs; can cause dizziness and tingling of the fingers and toes and chest pain if continued wordnet

Example

More examples

"Last year I had a hyperventilation situation and my CO2-oxygen balance is still wiggly today. It happens not once, not twice, but many times that I'm breathing consciously, and the risk is still there that this can happen again, because I'm an awfully stressful person."

Etymology

From hyper- + ventilation.

Related phrases

post-hyperventilation

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.