Loud Music Can Cause Lung Collapse

ahrenritter writes "This Reuters article discusses a report in the medical journal Thorax describing the cases of three young men who suffered a lung collapse (pneumothorax) apparently triggered by standing too close to very loud concert speakers. A fourth case occurred in a car that was outfitted with a 1,000 watt bass box. I guess deafness isn't all we have to worry about now!"

Comments

Re:No Discussion or Comments Can Be Found

[doctormetal]

How about: This music is breath taking?

Dr. Seuss

[Rufus88]

a report in the medical journal Thorax

I wouldn't trust anything in a medical journal made by Dr. Seuss.

The Scene is an Outdoor Concert

[Picass0]

Guy #1: Hey, I'm having a hard time breathing!

Guy #2: What!?!

Shakespeare quote...

[CaptainPinko]

Guy #1: Hey, I'm having a hard time breathing!

Act 2, Scene 5

JULIET

How art thou out of breath, when thou hast breath
To say to me that thou art out of breath?
The excuse that thou dost make in this delay
Is longer than the tale thou dost excuse.
Is thy news good, or bad? answer to that;
Say either, and I'll stay the circumstance:
Let me be satisfied, is't good or bad?

Loud

[black mariah]

I don't think it's fair to place this solely on music. There are many things far louder than your average concert. It's interesting nonetheless. If you've never seen bands like Floor, High on Fire, Khanate, or SunnO))), you really can't understand how sound waves can have that much power. When I saw Floor, my entire body shook. When they'd do sudden stops I felt like I was going to fall over. The only thing I've heard that is louder than them are top fuel (nitromethane powered) dragsters.

Before you ask, I wear earplugs at every show I go to.

Re:Loud

[Jerf]

I don't think it's fair to place this solely on music. There are many things far louder than your average concert.

While we'd have to wait for the science to be sure, I think attributing it on the music is fair. Your other loud sounds are noisy, in the spectrum sense. Only music (that I can plausibly think of as a routine occurance) will blast all the energy into a relatively tight frequency distribution. It is very plausible that this could have an effect.

While the global volume of a drag racer and a loud rock concert maybe the same, I would imagine that the rock concert could have a lot more energy right at, say, 30Hz, and if you're an unlucky smoker who happens to have a resonance frequency in your lungs there, well, that could be a problem.

(Remember, folks, Star Trek to the contrary most things do not have a strong resonance frequency, especially soft things. However, as you pump more and more energy into some object, even a very weak resonance that would normally never be noticed could be enough to tip you over the edge. Your lungs won't have any strong resonance frequency that someone could play to "tear your lungs apart" at a really low volume level, but if you've already compromised them by smoking you might just rip something in there. Eventually, loud sound starts to look like an explosion from an instantaneous perspective...)

haven't had problem breathing...

[sevinkey]

but anyone else ever been at a concert with such low rumbling rediculous bass that you can feel your heart beating a little off?

this only happened to me with dead voices on air, which uses a rediculous about of computer processing, but this was beyond nautious.

I loved this quote

[docbombay]

"But so-called primary spontaneous pneumothorax happens in the absence of an underlying disease, typically striking tall, thin, male smokers." So with enough bass, you could wipe out half the kids at any emo concert.

Not a gradual effect

[Pi_0's don't shower]

Sound is just a pressure wave through the medium of choice -- in this case air. It seems totally obvious in hindsight that in addition to affecting your ear canals, loud sounds can affect your lungs, especially when you're standing with your face by the source of the air compressions. It's no surprise that sound waves have been used to probe all sorts of cavities, everything from ultrasounds in pregnant women to determining the extent of underground caves. A big sound wave in a small cavity can cause damage -- I wonder why no one thought to apply that reasoning to lungs before? Maybe because the pulmonary cavities are so large compared to, say, the ear? As an aside, this article talks about the brighter side of sound, that using sound waves at just the right frequency can fight cancer.

Darwinism.

[bergeron76]

Pure and Simple.

Pneumothorax

[radiashun]

I had pneumothorax back in February, but it wasn't sound related. I was in the shower and for no apparent reason I felt as though someone had hit me in the chest with a sledgehammer. I thought it was a heart attack at first, but since I was only 21 I ruled that out as unlikely.

I waited 3 days before I actually went to the hospital and those were the most agonizing days of my life. I'd run out of breath walking from my apartment to my car (literally, 10 feet). I just had this sharp stabbing pain in the left side of my chest. When I went to the hospital the doctor told me that it was rare spontaneous pneumothorax, and that it usually happened to tall, scrawny males that were smokers (I'm not a smoker). Anyways, 5 hours later I left the hospital with a tube coming out of my chest and a prescription for some Darvocet. I had to keep that tube in my chest to relieve the pressure that was preventing my lung from inflating for 3 days.

It was really interesting to look at my chest x-rays though. My left lung had completely collapsed! It's never a good thing when doctors are telling everyone that's walking by the computer screen to "Check out how collapsed this lung is!"

Anyway, I just wanted to give some first hand experience.

Re:Pneumothorax

[Idarubicin]

I waited 3 days before I actually went to the hospital...

In medicine, these are the words that cause more morbidity and mortality....

Please, everyone--do yourselves a favour. If you're in such pain that walking ten feet leaves you short of breath, consult a physician. Even if you're apparently young and healthy, it could be a heart attack, or something equally nasty. Millions of years of evolution have given you a sense of pain for a reason. Listen to it--things don't hurt just because God is a sadist.

Chest pain is one of those things that can really challenge a physician because there are so many potential underlying causes, with widely varying degrees of severity. Sources of symptoms that may be confused with pneumothorax include, "costochondritis, esophageal origin, myocardial infarction or ischemia, pericarditis, pleurisy, pneumonia, and pulmonary embolus." Self-diagnosis is not recommended. :)

Particularly for acute circulatory problems (heart attack, stroke) time is of the essence. We've got a lot of really powerful treatments that are rendered essentially useless if you wait several hours. By that time, the tissue you want to save is dead.

How to repair a Collapsed Lung

[cyranoVR]

In short, the repairs hurt MUCH more than the injury.

First they make a small incision and spread the ribs apart. Then take a blunt probe and S L O W L Y punch through the lining inside your chest cavity (pericadium?). No scapel allowed - it might damage delicate tissue.

Suffice to say, right before they performed the procedure (the tube insertion, to be exact), the doctor encouraged me to scream as loudly as I wanted (they didn't put me under because anaesthesia is too dangerous for this type of "minor" procedure).

The aftermath is that for a couple days you have a rubber hose coming out of your side that slowly sucks air out, thus re-inflating your lung. Not a lot of fun.

Moral of the Story: Turn down that music you darn kids! :P