Experimental study: the effects of breathing 70% oxygen on hemorheology after incremental exercise

Introduction

How to recover quickly from sport fatigue is still a big problem for athletes. Many reports showed that abnormal changes of hemorheology induced by exercise could result in sport fatigue. This article mainly studied the effects of breathing 70% oxygen on hemorheology after incremental exercise to exhaustion. The purpose was to explore if breathing 70% oxygen after exercise was helpful for the recovery of hemorheology and to find out an ideal mode for acceleration of revival of exercise-induced fatigue.

Methods

20 volunteers participated in this study. They were asked to do incremental exercise to exhaustion, 10 of them rested naturally 30 min after exercise (as CO group), and the others breath 70% oxygen 30min after exercise (as BO group). The blood viscosity (BV), plasma viscosity (PV), erythrocyte aggregation index (A1 and A2), erythrocyte deformability index (TK), erythrocyte rigid index (VR) and hematocrit (Hct) were obtained before the exercise, immediately, 15min, 30 min after the exercise, respectively. Two different modes of recovery after incremental exercise were compared.

Results

The disorder of hemorheology was found in incremental exercise to exhaustion. The BV, PV, A1, A2, TK, VR and Hct increased significantly after exercise (p<.05); Breathing 70% oxygen after incremental exercise could accelerate the recovery of abnormal hemorheology significantly: 30min after exercise, except of the PV, other hemorheology indexes of BO group were significantly lower than those of CO group (p<.05). That’s the recovery velocity of BO group was faster than CO group.

Conclusions
The results suggested that the abnormality of hemorheology after exercise may be one of causes for exercise-induced fatigue. Breathing high concentration oxygen after exercise could be an effective way for recovering from sport fatigue.

References

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