A 20-year-old female patient has called 911 for chest pain. On scene, you find that she has shallow breathing with an SpO2 reading of 91% on room air. She states she was in a car crash yesterday and diagnosed in the hospital with broken ribs. Her pain is right where the ribs are broken, and she rates the pain as a 10/10. Breath sounds are present bilaterally. In this situation, the EMT should attribute the hypoxia to which cause?

Pathophysiology is a medical science that studies how diseases affect the body's systems. It combines the study of pathology (the causes and effects of disease) and physiology (how the body's systems function).

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