Old hive air therapy. Healthy air in the hive?

In recent years, many of the therapeutic potential of the air from the hive u.a. reported for bronchitis and asthma patients. So far, however, only experience reports of individual patients are available. Therefore, the floor air was the focus of a scientific study by researchers of the TU Dresden.

Healing power of hive air therapy explored. (Image: shaiith / fotolia.com)

In hive air therapy, the patient sitting next to the hive, either outdoors or in a small wooden house, inhales the approximately 35 degrees warm, very humid air of the hive, which the bees with their wing beats circulate. Breathing takes place via an inhalation mask with a connected hose, whereby the air is transported by a fan from the floor. Thanks to a built-in filter, neither bees nor pollen can get into the hose. Season is from May to September with an outside temperature of at least 18 degrees.

In their study, the chemists at the TU Dresden took air samples from the hives and analyzed their composition with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry: This allows the separation of a mixture of many components into individual substances and also the assignment to compounds of defined structure. In each case a beehive in Dresden and one in the forest botanical garden in Tharandt were prepared so that a foreign entry of aroma substances could be excluded by the materials used. As control samples, the scientists used the ambient air around the hive.

The removal of the beehive air from the cane was a difficulty: How to draw the air evenly, in what quantities and above all, how does the extracted air completely into the analyzer? Since no studies on hive air were available, the air sampling and transfer first had to be optimized in laborious preparatory work.

The research team succeeded in identifying more than 50 different ingredients despite the small amount of substances in the hive air. In addition, they were able - by comparative studies - to show that the compounds in the beehive air predominantly from the bee resin ("propolis") and the beeswax, while the honey embedded in the honeycomb, as expected, only a small contribution to the stick air supplies. More information can be found here.