Bagpipes and other wind instruments produce attractive music, but they can also be prime breeding grounds for molds and fungi.
Advertisement
The warning comes after a man from Merseyside with Scottish ancestry died of the chronic inflammatory lung condition hypersensitivity pneumonitis – thought to have been caused by regularly breathing in mould and fungi from his bagpipes which he played every day.
The findings by researchers from the University Hospital of South Manchester came after a 61-year-old man was referred to a specialist lung clinic in 2014 after seven years of a dry cough and progressive breathlessness, despite treatment with immunosuppressant drugs.
He had been diagnosed with hypersensitivity pneumonitis in 2009.
For more, see Tuesday’s Courier.
Examples include farmer’s lung, caused by breathing mould that grows on hay, straw and grain and bird fancier’s lung, connected to breathing in particles from feathers or bird droppings. Despite immunosuppressive therapy, he experienced a reduction in exercise tolerance from over 10 kilometers to 20 meters.
During a three month trip to Australia in 2011, during which time there was no bagpipe playing, the man’s symptoms rapidly improved.
They did find, however, that he played the bagpipes daily as a hobby. So scientists took samples from inside the bagpipes, including the bag, the neck, and the chanter reed protector.
They determined his favourite instrument was the likely cause based on his history of playing it nearly daily, coupled with how his symptoms improved when he took a break while on vacation, and because of the fungi found on samples taken from the bagpipes’ reed, back and neck. Tests revealed the instrument contained several variations of fungi, including Paecilomyces variotii, Fusarium oxysporum, Penicillium species, Rhodotorula mucilaginosa, Trichosporon mucoides and Exophiala dermatitidis. But despite treatment he died and a post-mortem found extensive lung damage consistent with acute respiratory distress syndrome and tissue fibrosis (scarring). It is often associated with mold or bird exposure on the job, and prolonged exposure can lead to irreversible lung damage, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
Hypersensitivity pneumonitis can be easy to treat if it’s caught early and the patient avoids the trigger, King told Live Science.
What’s more, there have been previous cases reported in the medical literature of the illness in saxophone and trombone players attributed to fungi and yeast.
“Physicians should be aware of this potential risk factor and promote wind instrument hygiene”.
Advertisement
But both doctors and musicians need to be aware of this potential hazard and the importance of good instrument hygiene, they conclude. “What’s described in the literature is taking the instrument apart piece by piece, cleaning it with disinfectant and allowing it to drip dry”.
