Every breath you take: hyperventilation and intracranial pressure.

Hyperventilation can rapidly lower ICP, but because it induces a consistent reduction in CBF and because the effects on ICP are transient, the only role that hyperventilation plays in the management of intracranial hypertension is in the management of acute elevations in ICP. In these circumstances, hyperventilation can be life-saving and can temporize until more definitive treatment of the intracranial hypertension can be undertaken.