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In my quest to improve my sleeping, I am thinking about getting an air purifier, I tend to feel quite bunged up when I sleep so I wonder if keeping an air purifier in the bedroom might help. I am however a bit cynical if they actually provide any real world benefit.
If they do actually work I am happy to buy spend 500-600 to get a decent one, although I don't fancy splashing out that much just for a failed experiment.
Does anyone have any experiences to share, especially in trying to combat allergies to aid sleep?
I would share your cynicism and go talk to your GP.
Assuming for the sake of argument that they work, it's a wedge to be dropping before you've even established the cause of your issues.
Do air purifiers remove allergens from the air? Yes, of course they do.
Air quality in the home is of huge importance. Humidity and contaminants.
Get a dehumidifier with an built in ioniser. Meaco DD8L - we have one of these as well as two others.
Interested...sleeping with a dehumidifier felt a bit better but I don't know if I was simply imagining it.
I would share your cynicism and go talk to your GP
And open a window a bit, if it isn't already. Dirt cheap, if nothing else
you want one with a HEPA filter
I tried one and it made no noticeable difference, but then im an incurable insomniac anyway
Do air purifiers remove allergens from the air? Yes, of course they do.
Air quality in the home is of huge importance. Humidity and contaminants.
Unsubstantiated absolute certainties aside,
If I had reason to be concerned about bedroom air quality I would open the windows as thelawman suggests, dust more, hoover more, wash the bedding more and replace the pillows. A Tempur pillow is one of the best £100 I ever spent.
Get the basics right before worrying about ionising your feng shui. As ever, one cannot provide a solution until one has first defined the problem. You're not sleeping properly, what's the root cause? Isolate that and then work forwards rather than throwing half a grand at guesswork.
you want one with a HEPA filter
I tried one and it made no noticeable difference
These two statements contradict each other. If a HEPA filter made no noticeable difference then why would the OP want one?
I got a meaco arete 20 and run it 24/7. It's costing on average a quid a day but the uplift in quality of life is amazing. It's got a hepa filter for purification but it's the humidity reduction from mid 90s before to low 60s now, that is the biggest benefit.
The house used to feel cold but it was actually the humidity, now the airs dry it's the same temp but feels much better.
I shopped around and bought it from the airconcentre.co.uk for c230. Arrived 12 hours later couldn't believe it.
Unsubstantiated absolute certainties aside,
Really?
There's an entire building science dedicated to air quality particularly with regard to the increasing risk of tighter and tighter homes.
True HEPA filters are the industry standard for scrubbing mold spores, asbestos etc it's absolutely substantiated that these filters clean the air. Any thought that these filters can't deal with significantly larger particles like dust mites, dander, pollen and other airway pollutants is ridiculous.
Yes fresh air is highly important, but filtered fresh air is even better. Exhausting contaminated air even better still, and best would be heat exchange with the exhausted heated air with the fresher introduced outside air. There's potentially 10' of 1000's involved with this and sure, opening a window and dusting more is cheaper.
Is introducing London outisde air as good as countryside outside air, no, of course not. In either case, you're still introducing more pollutants/particulate matter etc
But without setting up an entire HVAC system that brings in fresh cleaned air and cleans recirculated household air, a room by room scrubber will be a positive addition if you specifically suffer during sleep.
Indoor Relative Humidity is quite different between summer and winter, so you may not actually need to dehumidify, aim for 40-55%.
These two statements contradict each other. If a HEPA filter made no noticeable difference then why would the OP want one?
They contradict because you edited the statement to support your opinion.
I've got an airblue one but it was originally bought as I've been doing a lot of heavy building work in the house and I didn't want to breathe dust in.
It's by my bed now, I have the window cracked open all year around but would say it feels better in there when it's on. The light goes red, orange, green, white in use and the app shows air quality but unless I've got the drill out in the room it's always of good quality so benefit could be negligible.
I have this weird thing about my nose becoming blocked when sleeping so dab some vics under my nose before sleeping, I've been single for most of my adult life!
I was sceptical.
My sister in law was over who is allergic to the hound, usually popping anti-histamines after a few hours, we borrowed my mums Puremate and she was fine for 3 days.
It's got a paper filter same as a car, dunno if the UV and ion bit did anything but it definitely dealt with the free floating stuff.
I'm more of a window open person though, fresh air every time.
True HEPA filters are the industry standard for scrubbing mold spores, asbestos etc it’s absolutely substantiated that these filters clean the air. Any thought that these filters can’t deal with significantly larger particles like dust mites, dander, pollen and other airway pollutants is ridiculous.
Fair, I stand corrected.
They contradict because you edited the statement to support your opinion.
I quoted the relevant part of the post I was replying to for reference, the rest of it changes nothing though. They said the OP needs something which didn't work for them, which was entirely my point - if the OP is having poor quality sleep then they need to work out why rather than randomly throwing money at the problem.
After some research my SO bought an AEG AX-5. Chosen on a few criteria I believe: quietness; particulate removal*; volume handling; price.
The AEG is almost silent in operation.
*we have a cockatoo. Imagine living downwind of a Victorian flour factory and you have some hint of the amount of feather dander they produce. Without a filter running unattended surfaces get a visible coating of white ‘feather dust’ within a day or two.
It does a good job imo, filtering the air of an 88m^3 room.
‘air purifier’ sounds like marketing spiel.
not entirely sure what the connection is you’ve drawn between improved sleep and filtered air OP. If I was sufficiently concerned about my sleep quality I’d see my GP before buying random appliances.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/jan/14/air-filters-test-scores-gas-leak-aliso-canyon
Interesting study. Some have suggested the results can't be? haven't been? replicated but tbh I don't understand the methodological criticism.
I run a Philips one in the bedroom. It apparently improves my sleep quality (or at least my overnight HRV readings and recovery), presumably by reducing airborne asthma triggers. Filters are pricy, but last about a year, and off-brand replacements are available.
I got mine for £80
amazing piece of kit (when they have replacement air filters in stock!!!)