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Breathing technique goes global for Patrick
Lifestyle – Judy Murphy hears how the success story of a Galway practitioner is now being adopted in the world of sport
When Patrick McKeown placed his book, Close Your Mouth, in the waiting room of a Californian dentist a couple of years ago, he could never have guessed what would ensue.
Patrick, who lives between Moycullen and Spiddal, is an expert in the Buteyko Breathing method, called after Russian medic Konstantin Buteyko, who developed the technique in the 1950s.
Dr Buteyko’s research in Russia led him to discover that several diseases, including asthma, were caused by chronic over-breathing.
It may sound counter-intuitive, but according to Dr Buteyko, people with asthma take in too much air rather than too little. This causes the balance between oxygen and carbon dioxide to be out of kilter, which has adverse effects on the entire body. The science is pretty technical, but Buteyko’s treatment requires a person to reduce their breathing so that they feel a need for air. The Buteyko Method is all about breathing through the nose rather than the mouth to reduce the intake of air into the body.
Studies have proven that Buteyko Breathing works for asthma and hay fever, as well as a range of other conditions, including anxiety and sleep disorders. Dentists and orthodontists have long recognised the benefits of nose-breathing, especially for children, as it helps the face to develop properly and prevents conditions such as asthma and sleep apnoea later in life.
Mouth-breathing has been shown to adversely impact the shape of someone’s face. For that reason, Patrick has been working with dental specialists in Ireland and the US for years, teaching them about the Buteyko Method. It was during one of his trips to America that he left copies of his book, Close Your Mouth in the Californian dentist’s waiting room.
A patient, who suffered from asthma borrowed it and read it, following the exercises that Patrick had set out for improving breath control.
This man’s asthma improved and he contacted Patrick for a couple of face-to-face training sessions on Buteyko Breathing via Skype. It transpired that he was a literary agent, whose clients included Richard Branson, the Dalai Lama and Nelson Mandela.
Patrick, who had already self-published six books on Buteyko Breathing, mentioned that he was working on a new book on its role in sports and fitness.
The agent asked him to send on what he had written and Patrick did.
“He told me it was too technical and to write it as though I was talking to someone down in the pub, in lay language,” explains Patrick, who has first-hand experience of how the Buteyko method can control asthma.
He’d suffered from the respiratory condition since childhood and, despite two decades of using inhalers and taking other medication, it was only when he began practising Buteyko Breathing as a 26-year-old that he managed to bring it under control.
The Trinity-educated marketing graduate was so impressed that he changed his career. Patrick began researching the Buteyko Method, travelling to Russia and meeting Dr Buteyko, who died in 2003. Since then, Patrick has trained thousands of children and adults in this breathing technique, while emphasising that people who are on medication for asthma or any other condition should only quit if and when their doctor gives approval. He is not a doctor and he would never advise people to stop taking inhalers, he says. He just wants people to have their asthma under control.
People can learn to achieve this via a series of exercises and small lifestyle changes which help the body to use oxygen more efficiently.
Patrick now gives talks and lectures all over the world, travelling regularly to Europe and America to share his expertise.
Here in Ireland, he has worked with Professor John Fenton of UL and Limerick Regional Hospital, on a research programme which showed the Buteyko Method benefits people who suffer from rhinitis and hay fever.
In the office attached to his Moycullen home, Patrick has folders and files from leading international medical journals offering proof that the Buteyko Method can address a broad range of health issues. But while he’s in demand internationally, including increasingly at medical gatherings, the Irish Asthma Society has never engaged with him. He contacted the organisation in 2005, asking it to investigate its efficacy, but “there was no interest”.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Significant state investment is required to address ‘shocking’ inequalities that leave cancer patients in the West at greater risk of succumbing to the disease.
A meeting of Regional Health Forum West heard that survival rates for breast, lung and colorectal cancers than the national average, and with the most deprived quintile of the population, the West’s residents faced poorer outcomes from a cancer diagnosis.
For breast cancer patients, the five-year survival rate was 80% in the West versus 85% nationally; for lung cancer patients it was 16.7% in the west against a 19.5% national survival rate; and in the West’s colorectal cancer patients, there was a 62.6% survival rate where the national average was 63.1%.
These startling statistics were provided in answer to a question from Ballinasloe-based Cllr Evelyn Parsons (Ind) who said it was yet another reminder that cancer treatment infrastructure in the West was in dire need of improvement.
“The situation is pretty stark. In the Western Regional Health Forum area, we have the highest incidence of deprivation and the highest health inequalities because of that – we have the highest incidences of cancer nationally because of that,” said Cllr Parsons, who is also a general practitioner.
In details provided by CEO of Saolta Health Care Group, which operates Galway’s hospitals, it was stated that a number of factors were impacting on patient outcomes.
Get the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now, or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie. You can also download our Connacht Tribune App from Apple’s App Store or get the Android Version from Google Play.
On the eve of completing his 150th marathon, an odyssey that has taken him across 53 countries, Loughrea’s Marathon Man has announced that he is planning to hang up his running shoes.
But not before Jarlath Fitzgerald completes another ten races, making it 160 marathons on the occasion of his 60th birthday.
“I want to draw the line in 2026. I turn 57 in October and when I reach 60 it’s the finishing line. The longer races are taking it out of me. I did 20 miles there two weeks ago and didn’t feel good. It’s getting harder,” he reveals.
“I’ve arthritis in both hips and there’s wear and tear in the knees.”
We speak as he is about to head out for a run before his shift in Supervalu Loughrea. Despite his physical complaints, he still clocks up 30 miles every second week and generally runs four days a week.
Jarlath receives injections to his left hip to keep the pain at bay while running on the road.
To give his joints a break, during the winter he runs cross country and often does a five-mile trek around Kylebrack Wood.
He is planning on running his 150th marathon in Cork on June 4, where a group of 20 made up of work colleagues, friends and running mates from Loughrea Athletics Club will join him.
Some are doing the 10k, others are doing the half marathon, but all will be there on the finishing line to cheer him on in the phenomenal achievement.
Get the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune, on sale in shops now, or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie. You can also download our Connacht Tribune App from Apple’s App Store or get the Android Version from Google Play.
From the Galway City Tribune – An impassioned plea for a ‘masterplan’ that would guide Galway City into the future has been made in the Dáil. Galway West TD Catherine Connolly stated this week that there needed to be an all-inclusive approach with “vision and leadership” in order to build a sustainable city.
Deputy Connolly spoke at length at the crisis surrounding traffic and housing in Galway city and said that not all of the blame could be laid at the door of the local authority.
She said that her preference would be the provision of light rail as the main form of public transport, but that this would have to be driven by the government.
“I sat on the local council for 17 years and despaired at all of the solutions going down one road, metaphorically and literally. In 2005 we put Park & Ride into the development plan, but that has not been rolled out. A 2016 transport strategy was outdated at the time and still has not been updated.
“Due to the housing crisis in the city, a task force was set up in 2019. Not a single report or analysis has been published on the cause of the crisis,” added Deputy Connolly.
She then referred to a report from the Land Development Agency (LDA) that identified lands suitable for the provision of housing. But she said that two-thirds of these had significant problems and a large portion was in Merlin Park University Hospital which, she said, would never have housing built on it.
In response, Minister Simon Harris spoke of the continuing job investment in the city and also in higher education, which is his portfolio.
But turning his attention to traffic congestion, he accepted that there were “real issues” when it came to transport, mobility and accessibility around Galway.
“We share the view that we need a Park & Ride facility and I understand there are also Bus Connects plans.
“I also suggest that the City Council reflect on her comments. I am proud to be in a Government that is providing unparalleled levels of investment to local authorities and unparalleled opportunities for local authorities to draw down,” he said.
Then Minister Harris referred to the controversial Galway City Outer Ring Road which he said was “struck down by An Bord Pleanála”, despite a lot of energy having been put into that project.
However, Deputy Connolly picked up on this and pointed out that An Bord Pleanála did not say ‘No’ to the ring road.
“The High Court said ‘No’ to the ring road because An Bord Pleanála acknowledged it failed utterly to consider climate change and our climate change obligations.
“That tells us something about An Bord Pleanála and the management that submitted such a plan.”
In the end, Minister Harris agreed that there needed to be a masterplan for Galway City.
“I suggest it is for the local authority to come up with a vision and then work with the Government to try to fund and implement that.”
Families queue up for school’s offer of free house
West has lower cancer survival rates than rest
Galway minors continue to lay waste to all opponents
Gardaí and IFA issue a joint appeal on summer road safety
Marathon Man plans to call a halt – but not before he hits 160 races
