TubeNet

With all the focus on lung cancer of late, I wonder if there have been any studies that have looked at occurrence of lung cancer or other lung diseases in low brass players. Considering the huge amount of air low brass players use - some of it possibly tainted with petroleum based oil products - I would suspect a higher occurrence of trouble. Or it may be that all the deep breathing has the opposite effect. Any ideas?

--paul;

Well, stupid me, I smoked for almost 20 years, so I've never wondered if I'M more likely...

I always hoped low-brass playing was offsetting my stupidity, not worried that it might be anything in and of itself!

Don't know about Lung Cancer - but in my teens and into my 20's I suffered from Asthma on quite a regular basis until the medico's sorted out what was causing the problems. From then on I have known exactly what to do to avoid situations which gave me grief. The advice I received at the time was to keep playing Tuba - the physical exercise it gave my lungs was probably on a par with swimming.
One odd problem that playing the Tuba has left me with is that if I am going down with the weezies and I go see the Doc - he/she gives me a peak flow meter to do measurements and I still manage to blow the meter through the wall and have to spend time explaining that I am a Tuba player and that I really feel awful even if the readings show otherwise..........



Andrew Murray

tubiker wrote: if I am going down with the weezies and I go see the Doc - he/she gives me a peak flow meter to do measurements and I still manage to blow the meter through the wall and have to spend time explaining that I am a Tuba player and that I really feel awful even if the readings show otherwise..........



Andrew Murray

That reminds me of a woo-woo workshop I was at, where one of the things we did was blow our troubles into a fire....I damn near blew the thing out and heard several people gasp! HA! And I was, at that point, "just" a horn player, not a tuba player! I can see why your docs are a little confused.

MA

Lung cancer can be caused from many factors, but it has been proven time and again that a habit of cigarette smoking can increase the risk of contracting lung cancer.

If anything, tuba playing might be able to help temporarily alleviate some immediate symptoms by exercising the pulmonary system and cycling fresh air into the lungs periodically. But I am not familiar with any scientific or medical studies which have observed the relationship with lung cancer or any other pulmonary condition and playing any wind instrument.

I would be very interested in learning of any such studies.

David Spies

Playing tuba or any horn is really good for you. I smoked 45 years and believe the conditioning (I am no athlete) from a lifetime of horn playing fortified me to some extent against all that tobacco.