Advice for Clear Airway AHI of under 5

[JohnBFisher]

Here's an example page that outlines "impact of diaphragmatic breathing on health":

http://www.normalbreathing.com/diaphrag ... DRCzt2mDng

Just search for that phrase and you'll find a LOT more examples.

[padster]

... If one trains to improve diaphragmatic breathing, i presume it will directly be relevant to our breathing when we're awake, but i wonder if it will it also spill over to our breathing habits while we're asleep. ...

It will not impact respiratory drive and/or obstructions. So, if you normally obstruct, it won't change that. If you have central apneas, it won't change that. What it will tend to do is allow your diaphragm to work more effectively. You will be more inclined (even during sleep) to breathe more deeply. While it's good and will help (since if your airway is open and you are breathing you will get more air with less effort). Still it will NOT impact other issues with your breathing during sleep.

Hope that is clear.

Very clear indeed, thank you John.

For some time I have been looking for research which would prove or disprove JohnBFisher's statement. I have not been able to find any.

What I do know is that doing the optimal breathing training I have mentioned above my minute volumes are now 30% lower, I have increased energy and sense of well being, and the energy to move to a better situation and even loose considerable weight.

It has also been very pleasent to be able to smell the flowers this spring and summer, and not feel like going to the drug store for allergy meds.

FWIW,

Todzo

"my minute volumes are now 30% lower" ... from what you've shared, it appears that optimal breathing training enables you to breathe less and you now feel better. I'm a little confused on some basic concepts - does breathing less directly correlate to better health, or in your case, is your feeling better the result of the improvement in how your body uses the (lower volume) of air that you breathe now, rather than the automatic link between less air breathed and feeling more energized. Hope that makes sense

I would have thought that long deep breaths (and hence presumably increased volume per minute) are more beneficial.

Btw, have you managed to identify an Oximeter that measures Perfusion data which can be downloaded?

[padster]

Here's an example page that outlines "impact of diaphragmatic breathing on health":

http://www.normalbreathing.com/diaphrag ... DRCzt2mDng

Just search for that phrase and you'll find a LOT more examples.

Just had a quick first read. I'm going to need a second and third slow read through to undertand all the concepts fully but it's already clear that diaphragmatic breathing has a lot of benefits, much more than any normal person would have guessed.

"while the majority of modern people believe in the deep breathing myth " ... i guess this partially answers my question above to Todzo regarding the benefits of deep breathing.

"In contrast, chest breathing is usually larger and deeper ... But during thoracic breathing, blood oxygen levels are actually reduced due to inhomogeneous gas exchange: ... In certain cases, this pathology (chest breathing) can greatly contribute to or even lead to pneumoperitoneum, emphysema, chronic respiratory fatigue, severe asthma, bronchitis, cystic fibrosis, heart disease, diabetes, cancer tumor growth, and other pathologies." ... Oh my goodness! Chest breathing 'can greatly contribute to or even lead to' all those issues which are most of the things people die from. Totally shocking.

Why do cardiologists, oncologists or specialists for any of those listed conditions not ask patients to test for their chest vs diaphragmatic breathing, and to train for more optimal diaphragmatic breathing to improve their health? Is diaphragmatic breathing considered to be quackery or is it just not a profitable treatment option?

[JohnBFisher]

... Why do cardiologists, oncologists or specialists for any of those listed conditions not ask patients to test for their chest vs diaphragmatic breathing, and to train for more optimal diaphragmatic breathing to improve their health? Is diaphragmatic breathing considered to be quackery or is it just not a profitable treatment option? ...

How many hours of schooling do you think doctors receive concerning breathing styles and its impact on health? I'm willing to bet that it is less and an hour - if at all. Doctors don't think about it because they were not taught to think about it.

In contrast, I think about it because I was taught about it as part of my choral, as well as my speech and theater backgrounds. Both fields require breath support to be able to project the voice for the audience. In both fields I had instructors (teachers and professors) who focused on the why and how of diaphragmatic breathing. And even then the amount of time spent on it was not all that much. Either you "got it" and improved your vocal skill .. or you didn't improve. (It was generally a "sink or swim" approach).

So, there's no conspiracy. I suspect it is just not included (or emphasized) in the doctors education.

[Todzo]

Why do cardiologists, oncologists or specialists for any of those listed conditions not ask patients to test for their chest vs diaphragmatic breathing, and to train for more optimal diaphragmatic breathing to improve their health? Is diaphragmatic breathing considered to be quackery or is it just not a profitable treatment option?

Hi Padster!

Any of the doctors you mention - well - you would be sent to only if the doctor or PA you are talking to considers you sick enough to qualify for thier attention. In thier realm, only the very sick need apply.

So indeed, as you infer in your question, an activity which would keep you from seeing them has no place - in thier world.

And so yes, they consider it quackery. The studies that have been done go like this -" we sort of half hartedly had some people use the method, we got some half hearted positive results - so - the jury is still out". I guess you could say the do not really look because they have no incentive to find an answer. It does indeed generate no profit for them with our current way of doing things.

Concerning the perfusion graphs - well I think I jumped the gun. However, there may be enough info using a regular old CMS-50F and SleepyHead - I have not done this in fact yet but last time I used my CMS-50F with SleepyHead and expanded the wave form to look at the pulse wave form it did look to be that the pulse was riding on top of what would be perfusion. If that is true - well - there you go. So many things to look into so little time.

I just came from a conversation with a lady who has spent much of the last decade learning to relax. As our conversation turned to the possible origins of Apnea in me, after observing me for a time she noted that I have a lot of trouble becoming truely quiet. In her way of looking at it anything with breath should have a time of taking in (activity) and then a flow out and a time of rest between the two states. I think she has a very good point. If I want to, if you want to be free of OSA then we must learn to find the pauses between the times of activity. Probably that is the key to an AHI of absolute zero.

May we implement that key soon!

Todzo

[Lizistired]

Pugsy, my 50H has an perfusion index on the screen, but it doesn't record any data. I think the 50i might but I haven't checked.

Thanks for sharing Liz, I would have probably jumped in to buy it, only to realize later that there's no recorded data to work with. It seems like the 50i has been around for a year or two as you noted in viewtopic/t57464/CMS-50I.html … unfortunately, there's yet to be any info on how someone has successfully used it to track perfusion data and correlate it with their CPAP info. Seems like Todzo is on the case though.

EDIT, Apparently not on the "i" either.
http://www.contecmed.com/paypal/product_show.asp?id=125

Although it mentions "Real-time data can be transmitted to computers", that's probably only referring to the SpO2 value and pulse rate.

If the data can already be viewed, surely it shouldn't be a huge problem to record it together with the other info. Hopefully.

Hey, I tried my 50H and 50F in live mode today and if you want it bad enough to sleep with the usb connected, you can run in LIVE mode in SH and then save it. The "Plethy" graph shows up as well as the O2 and HR in the Daily graph.

[Todzo]

Hey, I tried my 50H and 50F in live mode today and if you want it bad enough to sleep with the usb connected, you can run in LIVE mode in SH and then save it. The "Plethy" graph shows up as well as the O2 and HR in the Daily graph.

Hi Lizistired!

I would really love to see what the "Plethy" graph looks like.

Thanks!!

Todzo

[Lizistired]

It's on my other computer Todzo, maybe tomorrow.

I only wore it for a few minutes and it loaded into tonight's time frame so I'll try to remember to get a screen shot before I upload. Hopefully SH will dump it then.
It's similar to the flow graph. It may also give some indication on movement, because it jumped around alot when I moved or flexed my hand.
I don't think I'll be trying to record sleep though. I turn over too much during the night, and I don't need one more thing disturbing my sleep.
I can't get the O2 and HR graph scales to adjust in SH so I'm not getting much from my O2 data anyway.

[Todzo]

"my minute volumes are now 30% lower" ... from what you've shared, it appears that optimal breathing training enables you to breathe less and you now feel better. I'm a little confused on some basic concepts - does breathing less directly correlate to better health, or in your case, is your feeling better the result of the improvement in how your body uses the (lower volume) of air that you breathe now, rather than the automatic link between less air breathed and feeling more energized. Hope that makes sense

I would have thought that long deep breaths (and hence presumably increased volume per minute) are more beneficial.

If you breath too little, your O2 levels go down and your CO2 levels go up - the higher CO2 levels open up your blood vescles and your heart beats faster to keep the blood pressure up and the cells provided with the O2 that is available.

If you breath too much O2 becomes satureated and CO2 becomes washed out - blood vescles constrict and oxygen transport is frustrated since CO2 is needed to facilitate the transport between the blood cells and cells. The heart beats faster (and blood pressure goes up indeed) to get as much blood to the starved cells as possible.

So I think a heart rate monitor is useful to find the optimal breathing ammount at a given exercion level.

When I do find that level, my circulation is good and since the rate is less than I was doing, my nose is happier since it has more moisture (less air movement) more heat (less air movement) and better circulation to boot. As well, my extremities are warmer and happier. If I stop breathing - the cells are "caught up" and so the urge to breath I do not feel for quite a while.

So while summer used to be a time of running to the pharmacy for allergy meds, it is now a joyful time of "hearing" the olfactory communication of plants and such. Much nicer indeed!

Probably the O2 and CO2 sensors were damaged by the OSA. I think that proper blood gas levels tend to bring these back a bit but I have also learned that a stuffy nose, cold extremities, dry mouth or throat, bad concentration, or bad hearing are cues to breath less. Indeed, a nose wanting to sneeze makes me stop breathing for a time and when I start again to breath slower. I have not sneezed more than once at a time (like in a day I think) since I started doing this.

Exercise really seems to help with this espically interval training.

I think the body simply needs the "right ammount" of O2 AND CO2 at any given time. Be it bad diet, bad media, lack of good exercise, chemical contamination, harmed microbiome, or whatever - I think we as a society have forgotten or killed our proper breahing. OSA is probably part of the fall out.

Have a great week!

Todzo