Are you sceptical about the Buteyko method? Are you wondering "How can doing some breathing exercises in the day time stop me from snoring at night?" Or "How can breathing less air make me feel less short of breath?"
Developing an understanding about the Buteyko method may make you wonder why no one ever told you about this before.
Read more: Understanding Buteyko
The part of the brain that causes automatic breathing is adaptable to changing conditions. For instance if you began climbing Mt Everest, your breathing would automatically and gradually change as you walked higher up the mountain because there is less oxygen in the air. And when you had finished climbing the mountain, and were back towards sea level, the breathing would once again adapt to the different amount of oxygen found in the air at this much lower elevation.
The primary aim of Buteyko method is to normalise the automatic breathing pattern. It is generally used to either eliminate an erratic pattern of repeated sighing or yawning, a rapid, upper chest pattern, or one of mouth breathing.
“I’ve spent most of my life breathing through my mouth because my nose was always too blocked. I’ve used nasal sprays and asthma puffers to control the symptoms of asthma but they have always been a short term solution. With the Buteyko method, I learned how to clear my nose and keep it clear without drugs. Four weeks after starting the course I haven’t needed to use any Ventolin. Something unthinkable just a few weeks ago!” Dave
In two clinical trials, it has been shown that by following the Buteyko method, people reduced their abnormally high breathing pattern by an average 31%, bringing it far closer to that of a healthy person.
This more normal breathing pattern allows better oxygenation, a calmer nervous system, normal function of smooth muscles and histamines, and also the immune system works more effectively. Because of these things, the people in the trials reported their symptoms had reduced by 71 – 81%.
The Buteyko method began to be developed in the 1950s by Ukranian doctor, Konstantin Pavlovich Buteyko, who made the connection between breathing too much and symptoms such as an excessive production of mucus, airway swelling, chest tightness, snoring, headache, high blood pressure, and so on.
He secured a government-sponsored laboratory for five years in Siberia, where he and a number of other researchers observed what happened to changes in the body due to changes in the breathing, as well as the types of things that can cause changes to the breathing. From this research, the Buteyko Method was eventually incorporated into the Russian Health System in 1981 for the treatment of asthma.
Konstantin Pavlovich Buteyko (1923 - 2003)
This most amazing man, who had the self-confidence to think totally outside the parameters that conventional medicine set for him, was born in the small farming community of Ivanitsa, which is approximately 150km from Kiev, on 27th January 1923.
After leaving school he commenced training as a mechanic at Kiev but this profession was interrupted by World War II, and after his experiences in the war he decided that the human body interested him more, so he enrolled in the First Medical Institute of Moscow in 1946.
Buteyko's interest in breathing came during his third year of medical training when he spent hundreds of hours sitting by patients bedsides, trying to discover the mystery of death. He noticed a considerable deepening in patient's breathing with the approach of death and after observing many, many people Buteyko found that he was able to form a prognosis on how many days or hours were left before the death occurred.
In the same year he was given a practical assignment to discover how to listen to patients' lungs. After a patient breathed very deeply and fainted, Buteyko was told that this was due to over-saturation of oxygen in the brain. In actual fact, a lot less oxygen reaches the brain when you over-breathe or hyperventilate, and discovering this piece of information in a text book caused the young Buteyko to wonder if other common thoughts about breathing were also largely inaccurate.
Buteyko suffered from headaches and high blood pressure and quite by chance discovered that by altering his own breathing, he could change this. From this fortuitous event, it was only a short step to realising that many people were breathing in a manner than is unhealthy.
His life work began from this moment. He devoted himself to studying breathing and developing ways to help people with many different health problems. His work often seemed far removed from conventional medical treatments, and because of this he was frequently met with opposition from his peers. It took a good twenty years before the Buteyko Breathing Technique was adopted by the Health Department of the USSR.
It is purely due to Buteyko's determination that thousands of people have had good health returned to them and we will always be grateful for the changes that his method has made to our lives.
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