Published: May 21, 2009 08:09 am      

Harmonic therapy

OLBH Vitality Center uses harmonica as therapy tool

RUSSELL — The green-topped oxygen tank rests forgotten in its wheeled rack beside Pat Dail.

A clear plastic tube still channels the life-giving gas to her nostrils, but Dail, 78, isn’t thinking about her damaged lungs.



Instead, she is wailing away on her harmonica, playing “Amazing Grace” along with several other pulmonary patients at Our Lady of Bellefonte Hospital.

Some of the others have oxygen tanks, too. All of them suffer from chronic lung diseases that make breathing a chore. They have taken up harmonica lessons to strengthen their muscles and make breathing easier.

“It really helps. And it gives you a hobby,” Dail said.

That’s the beauty of this new pulmonary therapy program at OLBH. Playing the harmonica duplicates the same functions of other therapeutic instruments and techniques, but it’s more fun, said pulmonologist Michael Ehrie.

It trains the respiratory muscles — the dome-shaped diaphragm beneath the lungs and associated muscles in the neck and ribcage — so the patients can inhale and exhale better, Ehrie said.

Basic harmonica technique involves using these muscles to blow into a small orifice, the same as other, more prosaic instruments. Also, therapists teach the patients to breathe out with pursed lips — just like a harmonica player.

It’s a new program at OLBH, although an established therapy technique.

Pulmonary nurse Jean Bowling had learned of harmonica therapy several years ago but it was just this year she discovered a harmonica teacher, Lewis Wyatt, almost right in front of her at the hospital’s Vitality Center.

Wyatt, who has been a lung patient, was working out at the center when he asked, in an offhand way, whether she thought his playing the harmonica would help his lungs. Bowling immediately invited him to teach other patients to play.

There are about 28 patients who take part, some of them so enthusiastically that they practice at home. They range in age up from 40, the eldest being 86.

All of them suffer from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, an umbrella term for emphysema, asthma, pulmonary fibrosis and others. The diseases destroy lung cells, making it difficult to breathe. About 80 percent of them use supplementary oxygen.

Breathing with disease-ravaged lungs is hard work, said Phil Boggs, 62, who attributes his troubles to 45 years of cigarettes.

“It’s like if you ran up a hill, you would be panting,” he said. The difference is, patients with damaged lungs get out of breath from slight exertion and it takes longer to get their breath back, Boggs said.

Playing the harmonica won’t regenerate lung tissue, but strengthening the muscles makes breathing easier, Bowling said. It’s a quality of life improvement, greater comfort together with the satisfaction of making music.

“I get a lot of requests whenever I get my harmonica out. I go ahead and play anyway,” jokes Jack Godwin, 78. Then, more seriously, “Anytime you do something to exercise your lungs, it helps,” he said.

The program has the potential to cut hospital stays by 75 percent, Ehrie said. “It keeps them out of the hospital and in the home and it saves money,” he said.

MIKE JAMES can be reached at mjames@dailyindependent.com or at (606) 326-2652.