A simple breathing exercise that requires only one tube, water and a bottle can reveal evidence about the health of your lungs.
What do you think is the age of your lungs?
With each breath, they are exposed to a multitude of pollutants, microbes, dust and allergens. Therefore, it is not surprising that these factors can accelerate aging of these delicate organs.
But they can also influence the aging of the rest of our body.
In early May 2025, an international team of respiratory experts published one of the first studies ever carried out to determine how human pulmonary function varies as we get older.
Based on data from about 30,000 men and women, collected throughout the 20th century, the study demonstrated that the peak of our pulmonary function Occurs between 20 and 25 years old. And the pulmonary capacity of women usually reaches the peak a few years before men, then declining.
The study leader was Professor Judith García-Aymerich of the Barcelona Global Health Institute in Spain. For her, this seems to be a biologically programmed part of aging.
Factors such as smoke, air pollution and conditions such as asthma attacks can exacerbate this decline.
The better your pulmonary capacity at your peak age, more resilient will be Against chronic respiratory diseases and other Advanced Age Pulmonary Health Conditions, according to García-Aymerich.
But pulmonary health is also related to several even more surprising aspects of human health. She affects our immune systemour weight and even the brain.
To what extent are our lungs healthy? And can we do something to improve our current state?
Studies such as García-Aymerich use high-cost equipment to evaluate pulmonary health. But there is a simple way to test your lungs at home.
All you need is a large plastic bottlea bucket or bowl and a piece of rubber tube. Perhaps you prefer to follow the procedures of the test in a washbasin or out of the home to avoid inconvenience.
- For starters, take 200 ml of water from a gauge, transfer to the plastic bottle and mark the water level with a pen.
- Add another 200 ml of water, mark the new water level and repeat the process until it fills the bottle.
- Fill the bucket or basin with water and dip the bottle, now full of water. Turn the bottle upside down in the water.
- Keeping the bottle in this position, place the rubber tube inside the bottle neck. It is not necessary to fit it firmly.
- Breathe deeply and blow into the tube.
- Conte How many water lines can blow out of the bottle.
- Multiply the number of lines per 200 ml (three lines, for example, are 600 ml). This number is its vital pulmonary capacity, also known as forced vital capacity (CVF).
“The test observes the volume of air that can exhale, called capacity [pulmonar] Vital, ”explains the head of the University of Kent University Respiratory Exercise Clinic in the United Kingdom, John Dickinson.
“This expression was first used by English surgeon John Hutchinson [1811-1861]in the 1840s. He began to observe that people who could breathe only small volumes of air had less life time.”
The American pulmonary association indicates that the CVF can decrease by about 0.2 liters per decade, even among healthy people who have never smoked due to the effects of aging. And research indicates that normal healthy CVF is 3 to 5 liters.
Dickinson says we should not be extremely worried if we have a low reading in this domestic health test.
“Many people will have difficulty completely emptying their lungs, which can lead to erroneous low readings,” he explains.
But there are also ways to improve our pulmonary health and combat any performance declines. And if you want to grow old with elegance, this can be a vital measure.
Another respiratory test
Dickinson points out that there is another domestic test to evaluate our resting breathing frequency – that is, how long he can exhale before breathing again.
“Inhale deeply and count, in seconds, how long you can expire slowly,” he explains. “It must be able to expire slowly by At least 11 seconds.”
Improvement of pulmonary function
Knowing the state of the lungs, evidence demonstrates that it is possible take preventive measures to increase pulmonary capacity and help reduce age -related decline.
Regular exercises, for example, can reduce airway inflammation and increase respiratory muscle resistance.
A salt decrease In food it can also be beneficial. Research indicates that excess salt can increase fibrosis and pulmonary inflammation.
On the other hand, it is also believed that the Food rich in fish oilsantioxidants and vitamins C and and helps protect the walls from the lungs against injury.
Bowdish recommends stop smoking and using vapesto avoid ingesting potentially inflammatory substances.
Professor Daniel Craighead of the University of Minnesota, in the United States, indicates that another way to preserve good pulmonary function is to maintain healthy weight and to avoid the accumulation of excess body fat.
“A abdominal fat can prevent The ability of the lungs to completely fill with the air, ”he explains.
But there is another way to really improve our pulmonary function.
Since the mid -1990s, inspiratory muscle training (TMI), or breathing through a resistance device, has become known as a means of increasing the resistance of respiratory muscles in people who vary from athletes and singers to people with breathing difficulties such as asthma and COPD. Research has shown that the TMI can increase exercise capacity and reduce blood pressure.
Another option is simply Sing or playing a breath instrument.
Researchers at the Louis Armstrong Center in New York are the pioneers of this technique, and try to improve people’s pulmonary function, teaching how to play various blows.
Other scientists have designed an electronic version of a type of flute named Ocarina to help improve pulmonary function.
As a professor at the University of Southern Denmark and classic trained singer, Mette Kaasgaard participated in a series of tests to examine how singing can help people with COPD.
Kaasgaard states that there is no evidence to indicate that singing can really reverse existing lung lesions, but believes that singing can still benefit the health of lungsincreasing our ability to use the respiratory muscles.
“A central aspect of the singing is the Capacity to sing long verseswhich requires control and flexibility of the diaphragm, muscles between ribs and abdominal muscles, ”he explains.
But in fact, any pulmonary exercise you choose can help your lungs face everything the world has to offer you one breath at a time.
