hi

[pain32]

how does breathing through your nostrils help as opposed to mouth breathing?


This discussion is related to sleep apnea, fatigue.

[Dr Rajput]

Hi, welcome to the forum, nasal breathing has many advantages over mouth breathing. Afferent stimuli from the nerves that regulate breathing are in the nasal passages. The inhaled air passing through the nasal mucosa carries the stimuli to the reflex nerves that control breathing.  Mouth breathing bypasses the nasal mucosa and makes regular breathing difficult which is not good for health.

Also the nostrils and sinuses filter and warm the air going into the lungs while mouth does not do it. Also it does filtering, moisturizing, dehumidifying, and smelling the air.
In addition, the smaller diameter of the sinuses creates pressure in the lungs during exhalation, allowing the lungs to have more time to extract oxygen from them. When there is proper oxygen-carbon dioxide exchange, the blood will maintain a balanced pH. If carbon dioxide is lost too quickly, as in mouth breathing, oxygen absorption is decreased which may cause breathing problems due to lack of oxygen in blood.

So from health point of view nasal breathing is good. Take care and regards.

[bapetnut]

Breathing through your mouth is better is what my Counselor told me and Now I sleep allot better,. when you breath thru your nose it's sometimes hard to breath and when you breath thru your mouth you breath much easier and fall asleep better. Sleep apnea is neither that, sleep apnea is severe snoring and waking up like you cant catch your breath and then fall back to sleep, this is why it is better to breath thru your mouth then nose!! Good luck