SE Valley Times

If you are suffering from sinus or allergy issues, a good New Year's resolution might be take steps toward finally breathing free again.

"Most people who don't have issues with their nose or sinuses have no idea," Dr. Brian Lee of Scottsdale Sinus and Allergy Center told SE Valley Times. "For the unfortunate millions of people who are suffering with chronic sinus issues, all of these sinus issues trickle down into every facet of their life, because when you're not breathing through your nose, you're not sleeping well. And then you don't have the proper energy and you feel foggy all the time."

The condition progresses slowly so that patients forget that what it was like to breathe normally, according to Lee.

Dr. Brian Lee | Scottsdale Sinus and Allergy Center

"Usually patients with chronic sinusitis have issues breathing through  the nose," he said. "Most patients come in saying that they're chronic mouth breathers, they don't sleep very well, they wake up with a really dry mouth, they start snoring more or louder. And a lot of that just comes down to their nose being plugged and not functioning properly. And that can definitely impact the quality of their sleep. And also if they do have sleep apnea, that can make (the condition) even worse."

But it doesn't have to be a permanent condition, Lee explained.

"People, unfortunately, accept this as the new norm and figure, 'Well, most people are like this, or this is just kind of the way it is,' and it's something they've got to live with," Lee said. "Luckily that's not the case, and there are a lot of easy, simple things we can do to really improve their quality of life."

Breathing exercises can help, according to recent research detailed in U.S. News and World Report.

A recent study in the International Journal of Kinesiology and Sports Science found that 10 runners, both male and female, who tried breathing through their nose only, instead of mouth, for six months while exercising, consumed the same maximum rate of oxygen as when they breathe through their mouths. However, the runners had fewer breaths per minute when breathing through their noses, and the ratio of oxygen intake to carbon dioxide output had decreased.

Breathing slowly through your nose, as during yoga exercises, extracts more oxygen from each breath, allowing you to take fewer breaths and still receive the same level of oxygen, the study suggests.

“You’re doing less work of breathing to get the same oxygenation,” George Dallam, the lead author of the study and a professor at the  School of Health Sciences and Human Movement at Colorado State University-Pueblo, told U.S. News and World Report.

The way to get used to breathing through the nose while exercising is to push yourself until you feel the sensation of what researchers call “air  hunger,” or breathlessness, and only challenge yourself as much as you can while maintaining nasal breathing.

Scottsdale Sinus and Allergy Center offers an online Sinus Self-Assessment Quiz to help patients evaluate their symptoms and decide if they might benefit from seeing a doctor.