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There are several products on the market claiming to improve your breathing, including PowerLung. This page is designed to answer common misconceptions when it comes to better breathing products and to help you understand the differences between these products. Most importantly, we want you to understand why PowerLung is nothing like any other competing product and any statement a competitor makes about being the same as PowerLung is simply not true.
Why should I choose PowerLung over similar products?
First, in spite of what another product may say, it is not "similar to PowerLung". They don't work - certainly not like PowerLung! It's as simple as that. Though we wouldn't consider these products to be similar to PowerLung, you may ask what makes PowerLung different? It all comes down to the methods used to create resistance:
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Restrictive Resistance
Used by products such as Expand-a-Lung, SportsBreather (a/k/a The Breather) and UltraBreathe. The best way to describe this method of resistance is to imagine breathing through different sized straws. That's all restrictive resistance is. You are simply "restricting" the space through which the air can flow.
"It's not fancy," says inventor Jorge Brower... he got the idea for his Expand-a-Lung by watching innovative free divers rig up their own equipment to train their respiratory muscles. "Because of lack of resources, they take any pipe they can find, cap it, put a mouthpiece on it and put a pinhole through it... mine is no different..."
There you have it. Even you can make your own restrictive resistance product!
Use this approach or simply use straws with different size openings or just whistle. Regardless of how you want to make your own "product" it will certainly cost less than even these products.
Unfortunately, regardless of how you choose to implement your restrictive device, it is only useful if you are aiming for no results. The restrictive method of resistance has been shown not to work and can lead to negative effects.
"...a decrease in inspiratory flow rate resulted and caused a drop in inspiratory pressures, even in situations where a smaller orifice than the original was used. This creates a paradoxical situation where reducing the orifice size may cause a decrease rather than an increase in inspiratory load..."
A reduced "load" means reduced resistance and therefore reduced training effectiveness. So even if you make it yourself you may not get the results you seek over time even if you increase the amount of time you use it and decrease the size of the opening you breathe through!
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Threshold Resistance
Only PowerLung uses this for inhale and exhale. There are muscles that support your breathing. Just like any other muscle in your body, the best way to make them stronger and more efficient is to strength train them. Imagine a person who trains or exercises with weights, machines or exercise bands. When a person is training, he or she must "work" against something, a resistance. In this case, lifting and lowering the weight. The weight creates a workload - resistance - for the muscles to work against and overcome. The more the person repeats the pattern of the exercise, the stronger his or her muscles become. As it becomes easier to do the exercise the person can increase the threshold to help make the muscles stronger.
That is threshold resistance, a proven method of training used only by PowerLung. When you breathe in and out through PowerLung, you are working against a threshold of resistance that is the same for every breath. You ARE NOT breathing through a restricted orifice where the load can be reduced just by changing the way you breathe. PowerLung has two cells one designed to train your inhale and the other designed to train your exhale breathing. Both are adjustable to set your level (threshold) of resistance. Exactly like how a person adds resistance with weights for strength training.
A study performed at the University of Toronto shows regular training with PowerLung can increase your inhale muscle power greater than 40% and increase your exhale muscle power over 150%.
What about the products that only support inhale breathing?
Going back to the weight lifter analogy, why would you only train the muscles in your arms when you lift them up but not when you lower them. Training for "lift and lower" is training for a full range of motion for the muscles. So, why shouldn't this be true for your breathing? Your expiratory (exhale) breathing is just as important as your inspiratory. Ask any musician or someone who has asthma.
Or ask Mr. Barry Jarvis, the inventor of PowerLung. He tried products that focused on inhale breathing only or used restrictive resistance because they were the only products available at the time. This former rower and marathon runner was not getting the results he needed. He needed to exhale. Being an inventor, Mr. Jarvis knew there had to be a way he could create what he needed. After much research and testing, Mr. Jarvis created the first prototype PowerLung and got the results he needed. He knew he wasn't the only one in the world who wanted to breathe better and as an athlete, he knew all about the "Threshold Resistance".
In the 1990's, a group in England joined together and introduced a product, POWERbreathe®, to focus only on IMT (inspiratory muscle training. One of the original founders also participated in research supporting the value of IMT only. A review published in March 2005 Curr Opin Pul Med, Review "Respiratory muscle training in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: inspiratory, expiratory, or both?" gave this summary: "Inspiratory and expiratory muscles can be specifically trained yielding improvements in both strength and endurance. The improvement in inspiratory muscle performance is associated with an improvement in the sensation of dyspnea, exercise tolerance, and quality of life. When the expiratory muscles are specifically trained, a significant increase in exercise performance has also been shown..." Remember, POWERbreathe only does inhale training. Yes you exhale through it, but there is no resistance, no training benefit and no exercise effort of any kind for exhale
The benefits of training with PowerLung have been proven time and time again. Each study showing that expiratory breathing is just as important as inspiratory breathing. One study would show an increase in exhale muscle power greater than 150%! The really great part about our proof is it's not endorsed. Independent researchers approached PowerLung and requested to perform studies on our products.
Similar products say they have advantages over PowerLung.
What are your advantages over them?
Yes, there are products that have an advantage over us (though they claim to have advantages). The only thing they have going for them is price and that is it. You know the story: you get what you pay for.
What does PowerLung have over them? You name it! PowerLung has far more advantages over competing products:
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The Proven Way To Improve Your Breathing
PowerLung is the only product proven to actually train and improve your breathing. Competing products use an ineffective method that is no different than breathing through different sized straws.
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True Flexibility of Control
Competing products say you have 100% control of all levels of their product. We know that's not true. Since they use restrictive resistance, that means all you have to do is change the way you breathe with any different sized hole you're breathing through and you change the resistance. What hard work to remember you have to breathe the same way every breath. PowerLung gives you complete control of the resistance for inhale and exhale on its products and is designed to help you breathe deep with every breath. You don't have to remember it helps you do it right. Nothing locks the controls and they are both independently adjustable so you can set your inhale at a different level than your exhale. That's true flexibility of control and true control.
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Comprehensive Instructions To Read Or Watch
Competitors claim our product is complicated to use but that is far from the truth. There is a right way to train your breathing and PowerLung makes sure you do properly. But why stop with reading how to breathe right? PowerLung is the only product to offer a DVD video with instructions on using PowerLung and properly breathing.
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Designed For Specific Needs And Goals
We all breathe, but no two people are alike. PowerLung acknowledges this by designing products for those into sports and fitness, music and singing, and health and wellness. PowerLung has talked to many professionals and put a lot of research into these product lines so that they meet your needs and goals. Do you really believe the competitive athlete, or even a sports and fitness enthusiast has the same breathing requirements and goals as a person with emphysema or COPD? They can't possibly because the athlete or fit person already has some conditioning in their breathing muscles. A person with emphysema or COPD is often forced into a more sedentary lifestyle and so their muscles - even the ones for breathing - may not be very conditioned. By the way, does a singer or musician want to breathe the same way as an athlete? These are just a few of the reasons PowerLung offers different models to help people get the most flexibility to meet their goals.
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Additional Training Programs and Methods
For those who are serious about your breathing, we have you covered. PowerLung offers ways to include PowerLung into your training program whether it is a book, DVD or hints and tips.
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Distributed Worldwide
You can buy direct from the manufacturer, but it is better to have options. PowerLung gives you those options. Our products are sold all over the United States and the world. Why wait when you can get it close to home.
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Customer Support
PowerLung trains its personnel and its retailers and distributors personnel on how to help people get the most from their product. Unlike other products available, when you call PowerLung for help during our business hours, there is no answering machine or automated answering systems to navigate only a person who wants to help you use your PowerLung the best way possible to meet your goals. It's not hard to use, but sometimes it is just nice to have someone to talk to - maybe even to share your excitement with a breakthrough. After all, Mr. Jarvis taught us the importance of being able to breathe better.
I'm still not sold. What other proof do you have?
PowerLung has been around since 1999 and growing bigger and stronger every year. Why not read what others have to say about their own experience from using PowerLung products? If you like technical information, check out all the independent studies that have been performed using PowerLung. Our products are carried by many retailers and available worldwide. Physicians, coach, music and choir teachers, and even dentists recommend PowerLung products.
PowerLung is the recommended brand
when it comes to better breathing.
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