Hypovolemia
low blood volume
Hypovolemia, also known as volume depletion or volume contraction, is a state of abnormally low extracellular fluid in the body. This may be due to either a loss of both salt and water or a decrease in blood volume. Hypovolemia refers to the loss of extracellular fluid and should not be confused with dehydration.
Hypovolemia is caused by a variety of events, but these can be simplified into two categories: those that are associated with kidney function and those that are not.
The signs and symptoms of hypovolemia worsen as the amount of fluid lost increases. Immediately or shortly after mild fluid loss (from blood donation, diarrhea, vomiting, bleeding from trauma, etc.), one may experience headache, fatigue, weakness, dizziness, or thirst. Untreated hypovolemia or excessive and rapid losses of volume may lead to hypovolemic shock, with signs and symptoms including increased heart rate, low blood pressure, pale or cold skin, and altered mental status. A person exhibiting these signs is experiencing a medical emergency and needs the lost fluid volume replaced.
Signs and symptoms
Signs and symptoms of hypovolemia progress with increased loss of fluid volume.
Early symptoms of hypovolemia include headache, fatigue, weakness, thirst, and dizziness.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Hypovolemia” as low blood volume. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1320276. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Hypovolemia” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.