How to Practice Buteyko Reduced Breathing Easily with Confidence?

由 admin | 6 月 13, 2024 | breathing exercises

Buteyko Breathing Method is a science-based breathing technique that helps alleviate and treat over-breathing-related chronic diseases, such as asthma.

Reduced breathing is the key element of the Method. There are two ways to achieve it:

By relaxation, especially the diaphragm.
By reducing the depth of inhalation or breathing volume consciously.

Method 1 is gentler and safer.

Method 2 is more intense with willpower, and people with hypertension and heart disease should avoid or be cautious practicing it.

The level of reduced breathing is often described in terms of air hunger, such as light, moderate, and strong.

In the book “Advanced Buteyko Breathing Exercises” by Dr. Artour Rakhimov, the level of air hunger is described as:

Light: 5 – 10% reduction
Moderate: 20 – 30% reduction
Strong: 50% reduction

However, in practice, it is hard to sense such an air hunger accurately, as we humans are not born with this type of sensing capability. We need a tool to help us here.

AYO BT+ is such a tool and the only tool available to date to measure breathing while doing reduced breathing exercises – no more guesswork and uncertainty.

Here is how:

Open the App of BT+ and select “Guided Reduced Breathing”.
Select the number of reduced breathing cycles and the duration for each cycle.
Then start with 5 minutes of relaxed breathing to measure your normal breathing volume – Minute ventilation (MV).
Once measured, based on your choice of air hunger, it calculates your target reduced breathing MV.
Next comes the first Control Pause CP1 measurement.
After that, the Guided Reduced Breathing cycles start. Each cycle consists of a reduced breathing session followed by a breath-hold.
During each breathing in and out cycle, based on your target MV and the last cycle time, it displays your target Tidal Volume (TV) for you to breathe toward or to use as a reference cycle by cycle.
If you can meet your target TV for each cycle, you should ultimately achieve your overall MV target.
Once all the Reduced Breathing cycles are completed, the second Control Pause CP2 comes.
Finally, a summary report will provide the key data for the session, such as Initial MV, target MV, actual MV, Reduced breathing ratio (RB%), CP1, and CP2. These data can be saved on your mobile phone and the App server for future reference.

Indications of a satisfactory reduced breathing session include:

CP2 at least 5 seconds longer than CP1, meaning your CO2 tolerance after the session has been improved, that is the intended outcome the reduced breathing aims for.
Your hands and feet should feel warmer.
Your noses should be unblocked (if they were partially blocked before the session)
Your breathing should become calmer and quieter, and you should feel more relaxed and comfortable.

The AYO BT+ Guided Reduced Breathing function provides a precise guide and real-time feedback to help achieve reduced breathing volume based on the selected level of air hunger.

The program integrates all key elements from a typical Buteyko Reduced Breathing exercise plus a saveable summary report, which greatly simplifies and automates the practice that would otherwise be time-consuming and troublesome to follow daily.

The real-time breathing volume waveform can also help visualize how well you use and relax your diaphragm, as a tense diaphragm will result in a sharp rising and falling breath that can be shown from the waveform on the App screen, thus it is a great tool for self-learning and practice.

A screenshot of a typical Guided Reduced Breathing

How to Prevent Coughing When Jogging in Cold Air

由 admin | 5 月 27, 2024 | breathing exercises, healthcare blog, reusable mask respirator

As a regular jogger, I run a few times in the morning each week, and I found myself coughing lately when the temperature went below 12°C. The cough was more persistent within 30 minutes after the run, and some mucus came out occasionally with the cough. But after that, the cough would disappear, and I would feel quite normal.

Then I realized it must have something to do with cold air. So I decided to do some experiments by wearing the elastomeric exercise mask AYO HC in my run.

Here is the summary result so far:

Date	Temperature	Distance/Pace	AYO HC	Coughing Status
Day 1	11°C	5.4K/6:02/km	No	Yes
Day 2	8°C	4K/6:20/km	Yes	No
Day 3	7°C	7.1K/5:55/km	Yes	No
Day 4	9°C	10.8K/6:11/km	Yes	No
Day 5	3°C	7.1K/5.51/km	Yes	No

It is very convincing that AYO HC helped me stop the cough.

Here are my thoughts:

For some reason (God only knows) I have mucus in my throat that becomes irritated with cold air.
During jogging, breathing volume increases, passing more cold air through my airways and making them drier, irritating, and making me cough.
When I wear AYO HC, it warms the air before it travels into my airways, and it also brings in the moisture accumulated from my previous breaths.
This makes the mucus less irritating. Even better, it dilutes the mucus making it flow out of my nose/mouth naturally removing the source of irritant without coughing!!
When we exercise in cold windy conditions, we would put on hoodies to keep our upper body and head warm, tights to keep our legs and knees warm, and gloves to keep our hands warm. However, we often forget about our more sensitive airways!!
It is logical and makes perfect sense to wear a proper mask to shield the cold wind from going straight into our airways, to warm and moisten the air before breathing in.

I think many people like me may benefit by wearing AYO HC too in this situation, especially for asthmatics and people with COPD symptoms.

So I recommend that people with sensitive and vulnerable respiratory systems wear AYO HC when exercising outdoors if the air is cold and windy.

AYO HC can also protect you in case of air pollution from wood or coal burning that typically occurs in winter, as AYO HC is a P2 / N95 medical-grade respirator. Due to its low-profile design, great field of view, and elastomeric reusable nature, AYO HC is suitable for many outdoor exercises, such as jogging, cycling, and walking.

Now, you may wonder how I dealt with the mucus flowing out of my nose and mouth when I wore the mask?

I lipped it and swallowed it back to my stomach!!

Gross? I would rather do that than coughing or spitting 😊

About the author:
Eric Fu, founder of Aimwell, exercise enthusiast.

How to Measure Control Pause with Aimwell AYO BT+ Breathing Measurement and Exerciser

由 admin | 5 月 12, 2024 | 6&6 breathing pattern, breathing exercises

How is Control Pause normally measured?

If you have been practicing Buteyko Breathing, you may measure the Control Pause (CP) daily or even multiple times per day.

Indeed, CP is the most important parameter to measure in the Buteyko Method.

According to Dr. Buteyko, the Control Pause or the Buteyko-defined breath-hold time is an accurate and sensitive parameter that normally reflects the tissue oxygenation level in the body at rest.

Research has also indicated a good correlation between CP, minute ventilation, and CO2 level in the body, the three important breathing health metrics, such that if we know one of them, the other two can be more or less correlatedly estimated.

To measure CP correctly, according to the Buteyko Method, do the following:

Sit down comfortably with a straight back and all body muscles relaxed, including your breathing muscles.
Breathe normally and calmly for 5 minutes – do not breathe more than you need to.
Then obtain a watch, breathe in and out normally, and at the end of the exhalation, pinch the nose and start the timer.
Keep the nose pinched until the first distinctive urge to breathe, then stop the watch immediately, and the time recorded is the CP. The first such desire often comes with an involuntary and distinctive push of the diaphragm or a pulsing movement in the throat.
The first few breaths immediately after the CP should be similar to the breath before the CP.

How does AYO BT+ help measure Control Pause easily with confidence?

The challenge or tricky bits of performing the CP test following the above guide include some uncertainty about what exactly ‘breathe in and out normally’ is before the breath-hold, how distinctive the urge to breathe at the end of the breath-hold, how to determine if the breaths after the hold are similar to those before the hold. To do all these properly is quite challenging for us humans. We need some tools to help us here.

AYO BT+ Breathing Measurement and Exerciser is designed to measure breathing while performing breathing exercises, and one of its featured exercises in its App is dedicated to measuring Control Pause – a great tool to automate the measurement process and aid Buteyko Reduced Breathing training.

The Control Pause test can be done with either an AYO BT+ Boost, Essential, or Lite as follows:

If you use a Boost, connect the L Module on the Left side of the mask, and the E Module on the right side of the mask, then connect the BTo module at the back of the right-side module. Optionally, you can also connect the BTi module at the back of the left-side module for inhalation resistance adjustment.
If you use an Essential or Lite, connect the BTo module on the left side of the mask, and the E Module or L Module on the right side of the mask.
Power on and wear the device, then open the App.
Select “Control Pause” in the “Featured “screen in the App.
The test starts with 5 minutes of relaxed breathing, and when the time is up, the App will instruct you to have a normal inhalation, then at the end of a relaxed exhalation hold your breath.
Once you stop the hold and start breathing, you will need to breathe for another minute before the App provides the hold time and the capture of breathing waveforms and data before and after the hold for your review.
The captured CP data can be saved on your mobile for later viewing.

Note: you can’t pinch your nose when wearing the BT+, however, there is no need to, as if you breathe even slightly, the BT+ will sense it and stop the test immediately.

The following screen capture shows a reference CP reporting screen:

blog image inserts - reference control pause

To determine if you performed the CP test correctly, the key is to make sure:

The TV adjacent before the hold is similar to the TV Average before the hold.
The TV Adjacent after the hold is similar to the value before the hold.

As a rule of thumb, the TV Adjacent after the hold should not be 10% more than that before the hold. If it is, your hold is a bit too long.

If the TV Adjacent after the hold is noticeably smaller than that before the hold, you may have stopped a bit too early, and you can try to hold a bit longer next time.

By measuring like this for some time, you will develop a more accurate sense or feel about what it means to ‘breathe in and out normally” before the hold, the “first distinctive urge to breathe”, and what kind of breath after the hold can be qualified as similar to or not more than 10% of the breath before the hold.

To practice and progress successfully with Buteyko Reduced Breathing, it is important to measure your CP correctly, and AYO BT+ is the first and only tool to date to help achieve it.

How does AYO BT+ help determine if a Positive Maximum Pause is correctly performed?

Positive Maximum Pause (PMP) is another way to measure breath-hold in the Buteyko Method. In fact, Dr. Buteyko mostly used PMP for his work.

PMP is defined as the maximum length of time you can hold your breath comfortably, and on resumption of breathing force your breathing into the pattern of breathing you had before the breath-hold.

Breathing after PMP is heavier compared with a normal CP, so it is harder to determine if the breath is well-controlled as expected without a tool. For this reason, the BT+ App continues to measure your breathing for 1 minute after you resume breathing, such that even if you can manage the first breath low but fail to control any breaths after that, the measured waveforms can clearly show that as an indication of over-hold.

As an example, the above reference CP screen capture shows well-controlled breaths after the hold, indicating an acceptable PMP measurement.

The following table gives the relationship between CP and PMP:

Montserrat - relationship between CP and PMP

Reduced Breathing Exercise Protocol with AYO BT+

由 admin | 4 月 26, 2023 | 6&6 breathing pattern, breathing exercises

Why Reduced Breathing?

Believe it or not, research shows that 90% of modern people over-breathe. Like over-eating, over-breathing or hyperventilation is detrimental to our health. Chronic over-breathing contributes to a number of chronic diseases, such as asthma, high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, etc.

Then what is normal breathing? The key is the breathing volume in one minute or Minute Ventilation. The physiological norm is 6 liters for a 70 Kg adult at rest. As a typical example of over-breathing, asthmatics tend to breathe at twice the normal volume. In the 1950s of the last century, Dr. Buteyko discovered the link between hyperventilation and asthma, and the Buteyko Method developed after that has cured hundreds of thousands of asthmatics since.

The critical factor to achieve normal breathing is the CO2 level in our body, which most of us have a lower-than-normal level.

The goal of reduced breathing is to train the brain to adapt to higher CO2 concentrations during a sustained period of air hunger by reducing the amount of air to breathe so that, over time, the CO2 level in our body will be increased towards a normal level.

Nowadays, more and more people become aware of the benefits of Buteyko Reduced Breathing and practice the Method in an ever-increasing trend, among them from asthmatics to mental disorders and even elite athletes, just to name a few. However, there are a number of challenges to learning and practicing the Method. One is that there are limited qualified Buteyko Method practitioners, and the other is lacking an effective tool to assist the practice.

Practice Reduced Breathing with AYO BT+

Aimwell AYO BT+ is designed for breathing training and monitoring, in particular, to train reduced breathing using the diaphragm via the nose.

One of the difficulties to practice reduced breathing is how to control air hunger properly: doing too little or too much will not give good results.

For example, light air hunger is defined as 5 – 10% less than the normal breathing volume, however, human is not born to have the ability to sense it properly, and this is what AYO BT+ can do best: measuring breathing volumes along with a large number of breathing data.

Here are the protocols and guides for reduced breathing training with AYO BT+.
Basic Requirements When Training at Rest:

Diaphragmatic breathing via nose only.
Sit with back straight and the full body relaxed.
Breathe calmly and slowly focusing on each breath.

Reduced Breathing (RB) at Rest

Obtain an AYO BT+ Boost and open the App.
Condition the breath: Full body relaxed, breathe slowly and comfortably, observing each breath and aiming at a near-zero air hunger. Do this in the Breathing in Meditation featured exercise for 3-5 minutes, then stop the session and read the recorded MV as a baseline MV1.
Calculate the Reduced Breathing (RB) MV for a light air hunger: 90 – 95% of MV1.
Do a Control Pause (CP) test and record the value as CP1.
Perform RB for 3-5 minutes followed by a Breath-hold (0 – 10 s after the initial urge to breathe). Do this in Breathing in Meditation, and read the MV, Tidal Volume, and times for each breath as feedback to adjust the breathing towards the desired MV.
Repeat ‘5’ for a duration of 15-20 minutes and relax the diaphragm and the full body in every breath.
When time is up, read the recorded MV as MV2.
Calculate the actual RB % by MV2/MV1.
Do a normal and relaxed breath for 3-5 minutes.
Do a second CP test and record the value as CP2.

Tips for RB at Rest:

It is recommended to do the exercise 2 hours after a meal or on empty stomach and before sleep.
Try to control the breath rate between 5 – 7 breaths per minute, so that the breath control and monitoring can be narrowed down to Tidal Volume in every cycle and Minute Ventilation in every minute for the most time.
After the exercise, you should feel warmer than before the exercise, such as your hands and feet are warmer.
Your CP2 should be Longer than CP1, ideally longer than 5 seconds, and you should feel your desire to breathe is reduced.
If the CP2 is less than CP1, check your actual RB and see if it is too high or low, and if the duration of the session is too long or short. Adjust it accordingly in your next exercise to have a higher CP2.
Consider using the BTi setting from 0 to 2 to assist the RB.

Reduced Breathing (RB) in Low or Medium Intensity Workouts

Find out a baseline:

Choose a targeted workout.
Obtain an AYO BT+ Boost or Essential.
Fit the E module on the Left side of the mask only and open the App
Fit the BTi and adjust it to the maximum setting.
Record the breathing using the Real-time screen.
Start the workout until the desired duration is reached.
Stop recording and use the MV recorded as a baseline MV1.

RB Workout:

Obtain an AYO BT+ Boost or Essential.
Fit the E module on the Left side of the mask only and open the App.
Fit the BTi and adjust it to a low setting, such as Setting 3.
Set your desired RB, for Light Air Hunger, 90-95% of MV1, Moderate Air Hunger 70-80% of MV1, and Strong Air Hunger 40-50% MV1.
Start the RB workout and record the breathing using the Real-time screen or GPS Enabled Exercise for running, cycling, or walking.
Read the MV every minute or the Tidal Volume often as feedback to adjust your breathing towards your RB target.
When the workout is finished, save the data, and read the MV.
Calculate the actual RB % by MV2/MV1.
Read Power of Breath and Work of Breath, and compared them with previous results for breathing efficiency improvement.

Tips for RB at Workouts:

Diaphragmatic breathing via nose only.
Relax the diaphragm, especially when the urge to breathe is heavier.
At the end of each relaxed exhalation, further extend it by pressing the belly inward briefly, especially when the urge to breathe is heavier, so that the breath rate is not increased too much when the breathing urge is high.
Breath-hold can be added during the RB every few minutes to enhance air hunger and CO2 tolerance.
The Breath-hold can be variable, such as starting from 5 s, then 10 s, then 5 s, then no Breath-hold.
Within 30 minutes of rest after the RB session, you should feel your breath is very calm and effortless. If you notice your breathing is still a bit tired, the air hunger during the RB may be too high or the period of RB a bit too long. Adjust the RB and its duration accordingly.
To avoid overtraining, limit the session with moderate air hunger to 30 minutes, and strong air hunger to 20 minutes.

Reduced Breathing Target at Rest:

Breath Rate: 5 – 7 Breaths per minute for maximum Heart Rate Variability (HRV)
Minute Ventilation (MV): 6L for 70 kg athletes. For 100 Kg athletes, the MV can be calculated proportionally: 100/70 * 6 = 8.6L
Control Pause (CP): 40 seconds.

Note:

The process toward the MV and CP targets should be gradual.
For CP, aim to achieve 30 s first, then 35 s, then 40 s.
It is recommended to have a minimum total RB training time of 1 hour each day, which could consist of 3 – 4 short sessions spreading out over a day. If you are an active person, Ideally, one of them is in low to mid-intensity workouts with a light to moderate air hunger.

How to Achieve a Good Night of Sleep Through Reduced Breathing?

由 admin | 1 月 10, 2023 | breathing exercises

Did you wake up this morning feeling tired and thirsty with a stuffy nose? The chances are you slept with your mouth open, causing hyperventilation which activated your sympathetic nervous system and put your body in working mode instead of resting mode.

A simple but effective way to prevent mouth breathing during sleep is to practice reduced breathing through the nose before sleep. This conditions your breath makes it nicely slow and gentle, and activates your parasympathetic nervous system, which turns your body into rest/repair mode.

An easy way to practice reduced breathing is to use AYO BT modular breathing trainer which is designed to train diaphragmatic breathing through reduced breathing via the nose.

In addition, AYO BT extends your natural airway that retains some CO2 off your breath in the mask, resulting in less desire to breathe once you take off the AYO BT.

To be effective, prepare to wear AYO BT for 20 – 30 minutes before bedtime, and set it in a lower setting such as Setting 1 to 3 that creates a small but tolerable air hunger.

The beauty of this method is that it allows you to do other things while performing the breath conditioning, such as reading books or changing nappies, the AYO does the work in parallel to reduce your breath.

To get the best result, however, you would preferably need to concentrate on your breathing, as if your mind is somewhere else, your natural breathing habit would most likely tend to make you breathe faster and more than you aim for, which can limit the result to its possible best. For this reason, I would recommend doing it in meditation, where slow and gentle reduced breathing and meditation work together resulting in enhanced benefits to your body, mind, and ultimately your sleep.

A novel and more advanced method is to use the world-first breathing measurement and training device AYO BT+ to guide your breathing in your meditation.

Here is the protocol:

Firstly, do not eat too full, especially too much red meat. No Alcohol.
Do the meditation with AYO BT+ before sleep and at least 2 hours after the meal.
Adjust the BTi to a low setting, such as 1-3, or a setting that creates a tolerable air hunger.
Select Breathing in Meditation in the BT+ App, and set a time for 10 – 20 minutes.
Sit comfortably, place your mobile phone in front of you at a height that allows you to look straight ahead and maintain a straight back.
When inhaling, gently and slowly push the diaphragm down, then a brief pause to prepare exhalation.
At the start of exhaling, simply relax the diaphragm and let it return to its resting position by itself without you driving it.
Pause in that position and do nothing until you have a slight air hunger and feel like inhaling.
Repeat the breathing cycle, pay attention to the following:
Relax your full body at all times, especially the diaphragm, and keep your shoulders low and relaxed.
Observe your breathing waveform periodically, and try to make each inhalation small and gentle, and exhalation slow and relaxed.
Observe your Breath Rate (BR) and Minute Ventilation (MV) to gradually reduce them from their initial values and maintain these lowered values.
Imagining the following:
- - Let go of everything except your calm and relaxing breathing, in and out.
  - No more responsibility whatsoever, just enjoy the moment alone by yourself.
  - You are so free, so relaxed, think nothing, do nothing, just breathe lightly and gently, in and out.
  - You are so free, free as a bird and soaring in the sky.
  - You are so free, no worries, weightless, floating in the universe, just breathe lightly and gently, in and out.

Your breathing waveform should be like the one shown on the right.

If you can breathe less than 6 breaths BR and less than 6 L MV comfortably at the end of the meditation, you should achieve a high-quality sleep afterward.

A 6-hour sleep like that is all you need to get you refreshed and pumped up the next morning.