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Trumpet Playing Maybe Dangerous to Your Health


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swthiel
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2007 11:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1,

I'm sorry you have the heart murmur, but that's an anecdote, not a statistic.

You made an empirically testable claim -- "Trumpet Playing Maybe Dangerous to Your Health" -- based on thinking about the Valsalva Maneuver. I'm asking if you can produce any objective, statistical evidence of this claim. I haven't asserted you're wrong, I'm asking for evidence that you're right. The burden of proof is on you ... convince me.
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gio trumpeter
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2007 10:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

‎‎

Last edited by gio trumpeter on Tue Aug 04, 2020 12:29 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Mon Dec 24, 2007 11:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

One last word on this subject from my end. IMO, there will never be a study to prove that Trumpet playing is dangerous to your health. I stated in the title of this thread that trumpet playing maybe dangerous to your health and gave a reason why. I certainly do not have the last word on this subject nor does anybody else here have the final word. Just beware and be aware.

I must admit, I think that this subject is worthy of such a study. It might also explain other things like why people kept passing out in the bagpipe group that I was in, why the Oboe doesn’t seem to sound free and easy especially near the end of their performances and possibly the personality differences between wind players and string players, etc.
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fraserhutch
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PostPosted: Tue Dec 25, 2007 12:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1 wrote:
It might also explain other things like why people kept passing out in the bagpipe group that I was in...


That I ascribe to just being in the general vicinity of bagpipe players. Occam's razor, dude.
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swthiel
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PostPosted: Tue Dec 25, 2007 1:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1,

I agree, it would be an interesting study.

The closest I've found is The Longevity and Causes of Death of Jazz Musicians, 1990-1999:
Quote:
The aim of the study was to determine the longevity of jazz musicians (JM) and their mortality patterns. The obituaries of subjects involved in jazz music were reviewed in a specialized periodical from 1990 to 1999. Age at death, sex, activity (JM or nonmusicians [NM]), and estimation of life expectancy (LE) at birth were recorded. Causes of death were compared with a distribution based on the general U.S. population, and proportionate mortality ratios (PMRs) were calculated. The study population consisted of 346 decedents. The age at death was lower in JM than in NM (70.4 ± 12.4 vs 74.7 ± 10.4 years, p = 0.01), and 83.2% of JM exceeded their LE vs 93.3% of NM (p = 0.046). Information on the causes of death was available for 212 decedents. Malignant neoplasms were the leading cause of death in JM. The PMRs were elevated for malignant neoplasms and suicide. The longevity of JM is lower than that of nonmusical decedents involved in jazz music; however, death before predicted LE is uncommon. Based on this review, malignant neoplasms are the main cause of death in that socioprofessional category.

I have access to the complete article, it doesn't break down causes of death by instrument. It also doesn't say whether drummers are in the JM or NM category ...

It shouldn't be too hard to do a similar study on trumpet players vs. other musicians or trumpet players vs. non-musicians. If you suffer from syncope whilst playing the trumpet, you're doing something wrong.

fraserhutch beat me to one of my favorite bagpipe jokes ...
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2007 1:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Steve, I can play this game too. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? I see you are a religious man so we can trace the problem all the way back to Eve but let’s just go back one or two steps to gain an understanding about what we are talking about. First for some definitions.

Cancer is a popular generic term for malignant neoplasms ...
http://curezone.com/diseases/cancer/definition.html
The word cancer comes from the Latin for crab, probably because of the way a cancer adheres to any part that it seizes upon in an abstinate manner like the crab. It is a popular, generic term because the actual medical term for cancer is neoplasia which, from the Greek, means new formation. Cancers are new growths of the cells in our bodies. Cells are the basic unit of life - each of us has trillions of them. Our cells help us carry out all functions of life - from the beating of the heart to the throwing of a football. Malignant neoplasms refers to the fact that the new growth has virulent or adverse properties that it may display in the body. Through expression of these properties, it can cause destruction of major organs, and in some cases, life threatening disturbances in body function.

Valsalva maneuver (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valsalva_maneuver) is the fall in blood pressure reflexly causes blood vessels to constrict with some rise in pressure. This compensation can be quite marked with pressure returning to near or even above normal, but the cardiac output and blood flow to the body remains low. During this time the pulse rate increases.

The pressure on the chest is released, allowing the pulmonary vessels and the aorta to re-expand causing a further initial slight fall in pressure due to decreased left ventricular return and increased aortic volume, respectively. Venous blood can once more enter the chest and the heart, cardiac output begins to increase.

Blood return to the heart is enhanced by the effect of entry of blood which had been dammed back, causing a rapid increase in cardiac output and of blood pressure. The pressure usually rises above normal before returning to a normal level.

My doctor, lung surgeon, said that VM is caused by the restriction of the exhaled air from your lungs. Trumpet players produce VM by restricting the air with a closed mouth and pinched lips. This is not to also mention restricting the air flow by raising the tongue inside the mouth to get various notes, pinching the lips smaller to get various high notes, then putting the lips next to the mouthpiece which is another restriction, blowing through a maze of tubing (trumpet) and then to increase this restriction even more by inserting a mute at the end of all of this tubing. He also said that VM gets more predominate as people get older.(Are you over 50 years old Steve?)

Cancer is propagated in an environment that lacks oxygen. Oxygen rooms in hospitals are used to help stop this propagation. Lacking proper body blood flow also means lacking proper oxygen to the body.

Can we not say that a Jazz Musician is more prone to be playing in an environment that is conducive for creating cancer being that the rooms/halls are smoke filled? Additionally, he is constantly producing VM thus damming up his blood in his body not to mention creating abnormal heart functions with abnormal blood pressures thus inflicting himself with a condition to help propagate cancer; so, what’s the cause, the environment of smoke or the ‘conditioning’ of the body to be open for this cancerous disease?

IMO, I think the chicken came first.

Steve, you might want to propose a law for the union of trumpet players from this reference (Gen 8:25). Lastly, Westview this is definitely nothing to sneeze at.
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swthiel
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2007 5:11 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1,

Once again, I'm asking if you can produce any objective, statistical evidence of your claim. I haven't asserted you're wrong, I'm asking for evidence that you're right. I'm taking your line of reasoning seriously enough to have this discussion.

On what seems like a weekly basis, one of my graduate students (highly trained, intelligent people) present very closely reasoned arguments that are quite compelling until you either (a) check their conclusions against currently available data or (b) collect some new data to challenge the conclusions. I did the same thing to my advisor when I was a grad student. While I enjoy a good theoretical discussion, at the end of the data, it's what the data say that matters.

What you have is an interesting line of reasoning; if someone reading this want to pick this up as a research topic, I think the results of a statistically solid study of this hypothesis would be publishable in the peer reviewed literature. It's too far afield of my current research areas for me to pick it up.

A couple of minor points:
1) I'm nowhere near fifty -- that birthday won't happen until next year!
2) Genesis 8:25?
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2007 5:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Steve,

If your doctor told you that you are creating VM while blowing your horn, would you negate his diagnosis and demand statistical evidence?

If you want that information, ask one of your students to do the research. It should be very interesting.

FYI, Levim also blew trumpets and all were required to retire at age 50. Sounds good to me.
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swthiel
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2007 6:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1 wrote:
Steve,

If your doctor told you that you are creating VM while blowing your horn, would you negate his diagnosis and demand statistical evidence?
I would ask him to quantify the risk for me to the extent possible and ask him about the basis for that quantification.

Quote:
If you want that information, ask one of your students to do the research. It should be very interesting.
Since I'm on the Chemical Engineering faculty, I would have quite a bit of trouble generating the funding to support such a study, and if I burned work time on such a study without funding or the possibility of generating future funding, it would probably be a negative toward my reappointment/promotion. Better for someone in the UC Medical College or CCM to undertake the study.

Quote:
FYI, Levim also blew trumpets and all were required to retire at age 50. Sounds good to me.
Retire? I'm just getting started!
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pfrank
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2007 6:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

One the other hand, there may be theraputic value to trumpet playing. My father was incorrectly diagnosed with cardiac edema (a Big Scare that was relieved when he did the test again on another day...) and early emphasema from a youth smoking "Lucky"s and he was given a pulmonary exerciser devise...told to use it daily...and guess what? Being a trumpet player, I could break the thing... it gives the Same cardio-pulmonary workout trumpet playing does.
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2007 8:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Steve,

Such a study would make a good research project. I can already see just from my review of the posts on this site many things about trumpet players.

It would also be interesting to note how many trumpet players suffered from Bell’s palsy and if a continued lack of blood to the brain would be an indicator for its cause.
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tromba mann
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 4:37 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I can't resist: the egg came first.

Some bird that was close but not actually a chicken, produced an egg with a genetic mutation that resulted in the egg being a chicken egg. Thus cometh the chicken. (This would have happened many times over and the changes would be very gradual if not inperceptible from one generation to the next, but looking back over a long time, you would see the difference).

Believing this, of course, requires one to believe in evolution (which I do).

As for health effects, if playing the trumpet were the worst thing most of us did to our bodies, we'd all live to be 100.
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davidkoch
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 6:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ok The Bird Came First God created all the birds of the air and the animals of land... And If Trumpet playing can be or is bad for your health, Ill die happily with my trumpet...
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westview1900
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 8:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Worrying may be bad for your health:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=9054737

So, I won't worry about any possible negative effects of playing the trumpet.
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 8:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Trombamann,

From you as an evolutionist, I expected such because they all think that they are “egg heads”.

Concerning your last comment, it is enough of what trumpet players are doing to their bodies and that is why they don’t live to be 100. There is no way to rationalize body abuse not even through evolution; however, as you believe in Rene Descartes, he believed in the unity of all knowledge and all fields of human study; thus, this trumpet body abuse could produce another genetic mutation and if genetic mutations are true, then they would still be taking place today. Would you please post your picture to verify that you have/haven’t been mutated?

Davidkoch,

Are you a jazz musician? Steve posted research showing that jazz musicians die of cancer; so, I don’t see what is so happy about that type of death unless of course one is a machoist … and not an egg head.


Westview:

Worry is an important component of anxiety and anxiety is often accompanied by physical sensations such as heart palpitations, nausea, chest pain, shortness of breath, stomach aches, or headaches. The more anxiety one creates, then the more worry one has. Anxiety is a reaction to stress. VM creates the same attributes as anxiety for it comes with stress. What I have done is to alert you to this condition so that there would be less worry, less anxiety and less likely for a heart attack providing you don’t keep playing in an abusive way to your particular health condition. If you want to ignore this information, you have every right to do so.
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westview1900
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 9:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1,
I'm sorry if what I wrote offended you, but I try to take good care of myself. I don't smoke or drink. I watch my weight and exercise. In order to maintain my weight at a healthy level, I often eat soy products in lieu of meat. No one in my family has ever gotten off this earth alive and I enjoy the trumpet. So, with the risk you mentioned in mind, I will continue to play trumpet because I feel that the enjoyment I derive from it outweighs any possible risk it imposes.
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 9:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

It seems that nobody in the trumpetherald forum wants to come forth and admit that they have suffered from VM like they have in the trumpetmaster forum. Be that as it may, let’s focus on how to work around or help lessen the effects of VM. Maybe this will help lessen the worry anyone may have on this matter.

I can think of a few obvious things just off the top of my head to do and maybe others here can think of some as well to share with everyone.

The first and main thing that needs to be done, IMO, is to lessen the restrictions that are present when blowing through the trumpet.

1) This means keeping the horn and mpc clean;

2) Not to play FFFF on high sustained notes but rather use a mic to lessen the volume from the horn itself if you want the volume louder;

3) Less use of mutes
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BGRtrumpet
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 10:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well Im guessing the admissions you got were from feeling the effects of the symptoms...dizziness and nearly passing out. WEll You know, I feel those symtoms occasionly and about half the time its when I'm doing breathing exercises--no horn. Just in and out all the way. I've never passed out my band director remembers people passing out doing such exercises while on tour w/vanguard. This I would attribute to a lack oxygen entering in the system as when doing the exercises you having been breathing out and not in for a very extended period of time. Perhaps it is the valsalva maneuverer, but if it is it happens to people alot, not just in trumpet playing.


Also, as to training regimes I would suggest that you ignore your professor no offense intended. There are many options for training of course, but never going above 70-80% is not recommended in any(of the more than several) of them. That's not so that going above 70-80 is good for your health, but in a competitive sport health comes second to results. Just look at all the football players out with injuries, the runners with new knees etc.

And again as I think swthiel has been pointing out, exactly what kind of negative effect does it have....? If it doesn't do I lot of damage (which would seem the case) then why worry? Live life a little. Since you get philosophical in these posts why not ask yourself why you're living life? A boring completely-safe life isn't worth living. Trumpet's worth whatever negitive effects it may cause.
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plankowner110
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 11:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Majestic1 wrote:
....Please take this book and your trumpet, go to the American Medical Association, get hooked up to their testing devices and prove to them that blowing a large volume of air through pinched lips next to a 4mm hole DOES NOT create VM. They need to know that the patency of Antonio Maria Valsalva, the 17th Century physician and anatomist from Bologna, is not true.


The expression "that's a bunch of balogna" all started with Valsalva!
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Majestic1
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 06, 2008 11:56 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

plankowner110 wrote:
The expression "that's a bunch of balogna" all started with Valsalva!


Good one!

Maybe I’ll be able to top you on this one. The Valsalva Maneuver is also used for making the bowels move and for emptying a weak bladder; so, it could be called the Valsalva manure.
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