Didgeridoo playing as alternative treatment for obstructive sleep apnoea (2006)
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.govUnfortunately, digeridoo playing is just as disruptive to partner's sleep as snoring is. Perhaps they should try bagpipes?
I suspect bagpipes may be the worst wind instrument to learn in this regard, at least if the goal is to train circular breathing?
I would imagine some basic breathing techniques may help, wonder what the research in anuloma viloma pranayama shows, but beware there's a lot written by random people on the internet about it without scientific evidence.
Several varieties of bagpipe I'm aware of don't even require breathing, since they're powered by bellows. The pipes are surprisingly hard to learn by the way. One normally starts on the chanter, which is more like a recorder and is not bag assisted.
A friend of mine started "blowing air into water with an straw" (making bubbles) very seriously. I was very skeptical to say the least; but after a couple of months the effects have been very eye opening. Not only it has helped sleep apnea and snoring but also helped with reducing their weight. They had an online group and most participants reported the same. The wight loss was reverted when they stopped for some personal reasons. I wonder if making bubbles in the water has the same effect.
I don’t mean to be rude, but what kind of personal reasons might stop a person from breathing into a straw at night
Probably summoning a fish demon.
Made me laugh. Thank you.
They objected to the Paper Straw Mandate
Just learned from comments here it's called "circular breathing"!
Just read how this works and tried it. A bit tricky at first but actually quite easy once you get the hang of it. And it's kind of a fun exercise. Now I'm wondering if I should get a Didgeridoo too.
Can you please expand on that? How many times and minutes a day? Full power?
Got a link?
same, my fat ass is ultra curious
I just made a test with one of the AI: It seems there is some evidence in there, sounds like mainly you are strengthening the muscles around your throat with that technique and this then can reduce sleap apnea a little bit.
Unrelated to the health aspects, but if you like electronic music and the Didgeridoo check out Aphex Twin's album "Digeridoo". It's so good.
I started playing didgeridoo 10 years ago for precisely this reason. Sleep apnea already cured by weight loss, but I knew by air pathways were prone to it, and I never wanted it to come back.
It worked
It took me 1-2 years to learn circular breathing, but even just learning to play for 15 seconds on one breath can give the "oxygen high" from breathing so much.
You can't get "oxygen high" from breathing normal air. The O2 levels will always stay the same unless you stop breathing for a while. What will make you feel weird in the head when breathing too fast is the reduction of CO2 in your blood.
So, if you breathe in an intensive manner for a few minutes, oxygen percentage in the blood won't change?
Yeah I dunno if I believe this, I played trombone when I was a kid... I didn't get sleep apnea until like 10 years ago. Unless it somehow takes like 30 years to develop, it seems implausible.
n=25, self report AND only players with partners. I think there’s merit to using muscular musculature to improve your sleep apnea but this doesn’t answer the question of why playing the instrument wasn’t preventative in the first place.
Because anatomy not consistently used declines in fitness?
And unused muscles start to significantly decline in your mid-forties. Maybe thirty years after playing trombone as a kid.
There seems to be a typing mistake. The embouchure should have diameter of 2.8-3.2 centimeters, not millimeters. Perhaps that can be done DIY from an PVC pipe with an hot air gun or a gas burner to soften and shape the end.
"Participants received a standardised acrylic plastic didgeridoo that was developed by the instructor in collaboration with Creacryl GmbH (Ebmatingen, Zurich, Switzerland, and costs €80 (£43; $94), fig 1). The didgeridoo is 130 cm long with a diameter of 4 cm and an elliptical embouchure with a diameter of 2.8-3.2 mm. Acrylic didgeridoos are easier for beginners to learn on than conventional wooden didgeridoos."
"Perhaps that can be done DIY from an PVC pipe with an hot air gun or a gas burner to soften and shape the end."
When I used to make my own PVC didgeridoos, I would melt candle wax and then dip one end repeatedly into the wax to build up wax layers until it had the desired thickness and shape.
Yeah that should be 2.8-3.3cm for sure.
For added fun, two tubes of roughly that size that air seal fit one inside the other makes for a slide didgeribone.
These two https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBGZoBYaLY must be best dorm neighbours ever then.
Last thing I need for my sleep through my thin walls is a neighbor with a didgeridoo.
I don’t think they’re suggesting you do it like a sleeping pill and play some didgeridoo right before bed. Rather, it’s about regular practice like with any other instrument.
Might help fall asleep, like a white noise machine :)
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30% of Americans have reflux, which is associated with obstructive sleep apnea.
Check out the papers on Inspiratory Muscle Training (IMT) and bridge swallowing.
Didgeridoo specifically?, or any instrument that requires circular breathing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_breathing
Circular breathing is easiest to accomplish on the didgeridoo. This is because of several reasons: optimal back-pressure (hits the sweet spot between lack of resistance on a flute and too much of it on an oboe, for example), loose embouchure (relaxed lips make it easier to puff up the cheeks) and single drone focus (no distracting fingerings required).
I also suspect the intense vibrations have a similar effect (probably stronger) to humming, which is known to dramatically (15-20x) increase the release of beneficial nitrous oxide in the nasal passages.
the study was conducted using a didgeridoo but the circular breathing seems to be the important mechanism. No studies have been conducted on other instruments that require or benefit from it.
I doubt many of them actually figured out how to circular breathe after one lesson. Source: have been playing sax for 20 years, tried learning it many times, still no good.
Aulos it is then!
The captcha on this site is irritating.
Original paper: https://www.bmj.com/content/332/7536/266
Looks like there was no placebo group? Don't know what that could be, something silly like otamatone lessons.
A placebo didgeridoo, otherwise known as a didgeridon't
RTFA? "Participants in the control group remained on the waiting list for lessons"
That's not a placebo. A placebo would be learning to play some other instrument like a piano, that doesn't involve breath. I also RTFA and saw no mention of any meaningful control group. For all they know the effects would come from learning any instrument, or just going to regular classes, or...
Now I want to hear about the possible effects of ukulele playing on scoliosis.
There are also various simple tongue and throat exercises that can improve your sleep apnea that would generally be better tolerated by your neighbors than playing a Didgeridoo, see for example...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNscQ3bGxNk
...along with various other videos on that person's youtube channel (he's an NHS Sleep and Ear Surgeon).
Of course, there are lots of underlying causes of sleep apnea that vary between people, so what helps one person may or may not be relevant for others. Seeing a doctor in the field should be your first step if you suspect you are suffering from sleep apnea.
If your neighbour plays the banjo, invite them over: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr3iI8gg2fo
Two wrongs can make a right.
45 seconds of didge, and then be puts it down!
Hope he sleeps well tonight!
Blame the song structure.
You'll hear Charlie McMahon going at it with continuous circular breathing for five to eight minutes or so on the early Gondwanaland albums (along with sliding length didgeridoo effects and 'singing' down tube).
Thx for linking that. Just … wow
Some might, in fact, call it the Didgeridon't
Jokes on you, my neighbours already play the digeriedoo.
> The randomisation list was concealed from the recruiting physicians and the didgeridoo instructor in an administrative office otherwise not involved in the study. We used a central telephone service, which the didgeridoo instructor used to obtain group allocation.
Oh, did you make use of the central telephone service did you? You didn't send the list by carrier pigeons?