| ▲ | Didgeridoo playing as alternative treatment for obstructive sleep apnoea (2006)(pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) |
| 178 points by kelseyfrog 2 days ago | 77 comments |
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| ▲ | wiredfool 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| Unfortunately, digeridoo playing is just as disruptive to partner's sleep as snoring is. Perhaps they should try bagpipes? |
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| ▲ | ncruces 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I suspect bagpipes may be the worst wind instrument to learn in this regard, at least if the goal is to train circular breathing? | | |
| ▲ | larodi 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | 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. | |
| ▲ | nephihaha 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | 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. |
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| ▲ | j45 an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Both can practice in the other room. |
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| ▲ | carwyn 8 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Double Reed instruments have also been shown to have a positive effect for those suffering from sleep apnoea. It seems due to the higher air pressure needed to play: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_reed Presumably quadruple reed instruments (that require even more air pressure to play) would be even better: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadruple_reed |
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| ▲ | Ringz an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I once took a didgeridoo course and played for quite a while after that. One weekend of 2×3 hours of didgeridoo playing, and my nose was incredibly clear. Like never before and never again since. By the way, you can practice circular breathing very well in the shower. Take water in your mouth and breathe in through your nose while simultaneously spraying the water out through your lips. |
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| ▲ | hks0 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 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. |
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| ▲ | mark_l_watson 6 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | My didgeridoo teacher had the class practice at home continuously blowing air through a straw - it still took me almost half a year to reliably be able to do circular breathing. I have read a few references that humming or ‘ohming’ help sinus health and breathing so I guess it makes sense playing the didgeridoo would help also. Blowing bubbles through a straw won’t cause vibration, so probably in itself won’t help. | |
| ▲ | LPisGood 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I don’t mean to be rude, but what kind of personal reasons might stop a person from breathing into a straw at night | | | |
| ▲ | ab71e5 18 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Is the weight loss just from sleeping better and therefore making better food choices? | | |
| ▲ | joshspankit a minute ago | parent [-] | | Underrated question Personally, when I have not slept well and need to be productive in a day, I’m much more likely to want to load up on sugar and unhealthy food |
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| ▲ | jcul 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Reminds me of that guy who started drinking water upside down to train his swallow muscles and cure his chronic heartburn. | |
| ▲ | hks0 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Just learned from comments here it's called "circular breathing"! | | |
| ▲ | sigmoid10 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | 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. | | |
| ▲ | jbaber an hour ago | parent [-] | | Yes. Someone who masters circular breathing in a weekend should start playing a wind instrument. |
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| ▲ | Salmoneo 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I saw a documentary where a vocal coach used a similar technique to help metal singers sing in a way that didn't destroy their throat and vocal chords | |
| ▲ | barrenko an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Seems related to our aquatic mammal past. | |
| ▲ | Traubenfuchs 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Can you please expand on that? How many times and minutes a day? Full power? Got a link? | | |
| ▲ | baddash 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | same, my fat ass is ultra curious | | |
| ▲ | KellyCriterion 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | 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. |
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| ▲ | Darmani 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 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. |
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| ▲ | sigmoid10 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | 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. | | |
| ▲ | dmos62 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | So, if you breathe in an intensive manner for a few minutes, oxygen percentage in the blood won't change? | | |
| ▲ | thfuran 34 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | Blood oxygen saturation is always near 100% in a healthy person. 95% is the low end of normal. Dropping to 90% is considered hypoxemia, and 80% is a medical emergency. So there really shouldn’t be any room to increase it significantly. | |
| ▲ | jcul 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | If you've ever done the wim hof breathing method, it is a very intense experience. Basically hyperventilation + long breath holds. Probably similar to what free divers do without the mammalian dive reflex due to the cold water. Or like a dangerous game kids used to do when I was in school where you hyperventilate and then have someone press on your chest until you pass out. But anyway, I'm not sure if the science would back it up, but Wim Hof describes it as over oxygenating the blood and then stopping and letting CO2 ramp up or something. Whether it is significantly dropping the CO2 or increasing oxygen during the hyperventilation phase, isn't it kind of the same thing? Adjusting the ratio. Anecdotally, when I was doing it regularly I seemed to not get sick at all. | |
| ▲ | cenamus 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | No it would stay at pretty much 100% (as is normal). But co2 goes down, which lessens the ability of oxygen to come out of the blood. That's why you get dizzy when hyperventilating | |
| ▲ | TylerE an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Nope. The blood is already fully saturated with oxygen (in a healthy-ish person) at rest. Even intensely breathing pure o2 can't give you a saturation higher than 100%. |
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| ▲ | lemonberry 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 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. |
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| ▲ | idiocrat 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 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." |
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| ▲ | roel_v 6 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | "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. | | |
| ▲ | mark_l_watson a minute ago | parent | next [-] | | Twenty years ago my neighbor, a retired surgeon, made me a PVC didgeridoo and did the wax buildup thing - I still mostly play that didgeridoo. Years later my wife bought me a traditional heavy didgeridoo from Australia, but it doesn’t play as well; still, when I played at a friend’s wedding I used the Australian one because it looks better :-) | |
| ▲ | smartial_arts 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZiqEhJJqtbc | |
| ▲ | eth0up an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | I had excellent results using a large section of black bamboo, though I forget the exact taxonomy (lako?). I meticulously beat out the segment walls, then with a rasp fastened to a long stick, filed down the ridges. After sanding, I finished it with oil based stain, which necessitated it living outdoors for a while. In the end it proved a fine primitive instrument. I gifted it to someone and miss it. I can attest to the therapeutic effects of mastering the didge. PVC works, but the acoustics do seem superior with actual plant material. Certainly the feel. Update: I used beeswax for the gob hole. |
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| ▲ | andersmurphy 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Yeah that should be 2.8-3.3cm for sure. | | |
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| ▲ | asdff 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Last thing I need for my sleep through my thin walls is a neighbor with a didgeridoo. |
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| ▲ | dgellow 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Might help fall asleep, like a white noise machine :) | |
| ▲ | latexr 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | 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. |
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| ▲ | nopurpose 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| These two https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBGZoBYaLY must be best dorm neighbours ever then. |
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| ▲ | DTrejo 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 30% of Americans have reflux, which is associated with obstructive sleep apnea. Check out the papers on Inspiratory Muscle Training (IMT) and bridge swallowing. |
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| ▲ | nubinetwork 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 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. |
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| ▲ | y-curious 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | 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. | | |
| ▲ | mariusor 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | Because anatomy not consistently used declines in fitness? | | |
| ▲ | masfuerte 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | And unused muscles start to significantly decline in your mid-forties. Maybe thirty years after playing trombone as a kid. |
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| ▲ | sam-cop-vimes 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Unrelated to the content of this submission, but trying to visit this link in Firefox takes me into an endless recaptcha loop, whereas visiting in Chrome took me to the site without any captcha. |
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| ▲ | sph 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Sorry to hear that! You must be using an unapproved browser. Please contact your nearest Cloudflare ChildProtect™ agency to request a one year license to browse the internet. You will be asked to provide a government ID card or equivalent. | |
| ▲ | StilesCrisis an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Wondering what sort of plugins you've got on the Firefox side. If they're stripping out headers, for instance, it's a good way to make yourself look like a bot. | |
| ▲ | galangalalgol an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Firefox on android with ublock origin didn't hit any captchas. I wonder what triggers them? |
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| ▲ | dartharva 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| The captcha on this site is irritating. Original paper: https://www.bmj.com/content/332/7536/266 |
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| ▲ | mastazi 8 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Thank you, I was completely unable to access that page with my current browser settings. |
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| ▲ | jimmcslim 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Didgeridoo specifically?, or any instrument that requires circular breathing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_breathing |
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| ▲ | pegasus 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | 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. | |
| ▲ | scrumbledober 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | 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. | | |
| ▲ | jojobas 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | 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. | |
| ▲ | marginalia_nu 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Aulos it is then! |
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| ▲ | brador 21 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Anything except just losing weight. You know who doesn’t have sleep apnea? Skinny people. I mean wafer thin. They only get it from actual constructive nasal obstruction. |
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| ▲ | jojobas 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Looks like there was no placebo group? Don't know what that could be, something silly like otamatone lessons. |
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| ▲ | RobotToaster 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | A placebo didgeridoo, otherwise known as a didgeridon't | |
| ▲ | askvictor 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | RTFA? "Participants in the control group remained on the waiting list for lessons" | | |
| ▲ | gblargg 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | 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... |
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| ▲ | nephihaha 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Now I want to hear about the possible effects of ukulele playing on scoliosis. |
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| ▲ | georgemcbay 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| 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. |
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| ▲ | vasco 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| > 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? |