Portugal L G, Mehta R H, Smith B E, Sabnani J B, Matava M J
Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, University of Illinois College of Medicine, Chicago, USA.
Am J Rhinol. 1997 Sep-Oct;11(5):393-7. doi: 10.2500/105065897781286061.
In order to improve nasal breathing during competition, many athletes recently have been wearing a spring-loaded, external nasal dilator referred to as the Breathe-Right device (BRD). Although there are many subjective claims that this device improves breathing during exercise, there are currently no controlled studies documenting its efficacy. To determine objectively whether the device improves the nasal airway, 20 subjects (10 Caucasian and 10 African-American) were studied during rest and after 15 minutes of exercise using anterior rhinomanometry and acoustic rhinometry to measure changes in airway resistance and minimal cross-sectional area, respectively. We found that the BRD exerts its main effect in the region of the nasal valve improving the airway an overall 21% in our group of subjects. This anatomic improvement in nasal airway resulted in an overall 27% reduction in nasal resistance in the Caucasian group. However, in the African-American group, a wider range of resistance changes was observed with application of the BRD with significant improvement in nasal resistance in some subjects but paradoxical worsening in others. In the African-American group as a whole, no significant change in nasal resistance occurred with application of the BRD. These measured differences are likely due to variations in nasal anatomy that exist not only between races but also between individuals within a given race. In addition, this study confirms the well known decongestant effects of exercise providing anatomic data with acoustic rhinometry not previously documented in the literature. Overall improvement in nasal airway seen with application of the BRD occurred independent of these exercise-related decongestant effects.
为了在比赛期间改善鼻腔通气，最近许多运动员都佩戴了一种弹簧加载的外部鼻扩张器，即呼吸顺畅装置（BRD）。尽管有许多主观说法称该装置能改善运动时的呼吸，但目前尚无对照研究证明其有效性。为了客观确定该装置是否能改善鼻气道，我们对20名受试者（10名白种人和10名非裔美国人）在休息时以及运动15分钟后进行了研究，分别使用前鼻测压法和鼻声反射法来测量气道阻力和最小横截面积的变化。我们发现，BRD在鼻瓣膜区域发挥主要作用，在我们的受试者组中，气道整体改善了21%。鼻气道的这种解剖学改善使白种人组的鼻阻力总体降低了27%。然而，在非裔美国人组中，应用BRD后观察到更广泛的阻力变化，一些受试者的鼻阻力有显著改善，而另一些受试者则出现了反常的恶化。在整个非裔美国人组中，应用BRD后鼻阻力没有显著变化。这些测量到的差异可能是由于鼻解剖结构的差异造成的，这种差异不仅存在于不同种族之间，也存在于同一种族的个体之间。此外，本研究证实了运动众所周知的减充血作用，并提供了鼻声反射法的解剖学数据，这在以前的文献中没有记载。应用BRD后观察到的鼻气道总体改善与这些与运动相关的减充血作用无关。
