Home Sweet Home: Prioritizing Air Quality for Wellness
If you are relatively asymptomatic, you may not think much about the air quality in your home. However, poor air quality can significantly impact your health, potentially leading to more severe and long-term complications.
There are many practical and sustainable ways to improve the overall air quality of your home, including air purifiers for allergies, well-managed ventilation systems, regularly maintained heating systems, and house plants.
Reduce Pollutants & Allergens
An essential way to improve the quality of indoor air is to learn about common sources of pollution that affect households and find ways to drastically limit their impact or remove them altogether.
These often include radon, a natural radioactive gas that can seep through cracks in the earth and build up in your home; secondhand smoke; numerous cleaning products like bleach, cleaning sprays, and glass cleaners; and formaldehyde, a well-known volatile organic compound, or VOC, found in many regular household items.
In addition, many common allergens and irritants, such as dust, pet dander, dust mites, and mold, are found in indoor spaces. Managing levels of these allergens will typically improve the overall air quality in your home and reduce the risk of experiencing respiratory issues. Management requires both prevention and upkeep.
Brushing and washing pets regularly, choosing hypoallergenic pillows, duvets, and mattresses, washing bedding every fortnight, frequent dusting and vacuuming, and employing efficient mold elimination techniques are all effective strategies.
Use Air Purifiers
Air purifiers have surged in popularity in recent years as an effective tool for improving the quality of indoor air. Select a model or brand that uses a high-efficiency particulate-absorbing (HEPA) filter.
These filters have been found to remove 99% of harmful particles from the air.
However, it is crucial to note that air purifiers are not able to remove all types of pollutants, so it is worthwhile considering an air filter to work in tandem with an air purifier. Air filters can reduce VOCs, mold spores, excess carbon dioxide allergens, and smoke.
Improve Ventilation
Keeping a consistent airflow through your home is a simple and potentially cost-effective way to improve the air quality throughout your household.
Opening certain windows and doors to allow for uninterrupted airflow can be extremely effective in bringing in fresh and clean air, as long as the outdoor air is low in pollen and other pollutants.
However, in homes where air enters through vents, it is vital to ensure that these ventilation systems aren’t contributing to the overall problem. Y
ou can do this by regularly cleaning the filters of your heating and cooling systems, ensuring any air ducts are clean and unobstructed, checking the filters of appliances that bring in air, and changing them as instructed.
Reduce Dampness
Dampness in your household can lead to many serious health hazards, including mold growth, which could be deadly. Dampness and high humidity conditions can also leak VOCs into the air. Various factors can lead to damp areas in your home, including humid climates, leaking pipes or roofs, pooling water, and poor ventilation in bathrooms and kitchens.
Reducing these conditions by using a dehumidifier, turning on a ventilation fan, opening windows, and eliminating areas of moisture and pooling water in your home will lower the risk of the effects of damp conditions and improve air quality.
Utilize Indoor Plants
Many experts recommend using house plants to help purify the air in your home. Numerous research studies reveal that house plants not only contribute to positive mental health but also, according to a 2017 review, could help reduce specific air pollutants like VOCs and fine particles.
However, it is crucial to select the correct type of plants, as some options could contribute to your problems rather than solve them.
Three main plants have been recognized to be effective at keeping air clean: Dracaea, a popular genus easily recognized by sword-shaped leaves; Spathiphyllum, also known as peace lily; and Hedera helix, which is common ivy.
Limit Scented Products
You may enjoy the pleasant aromas of your favorite scented candle or wax melts, but the reality is that these products are contributing to the poor air quality inside your home.
Some scented products are created using harmful volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, including formaldehyde, toluene, and benzene, which can pose severe hazards to your health.
Extended exposure to VOCs can lead to headaches, dizziness, and irritation of the eyes, nose, and throat. Many cleaning, degreasing, and disinfecting products, as well as cosmetics and hobby items, contain these compounds and should be avoided as much as possible or used in a ventilated space.
Check Heating Systems
Some heating systems significantly impact air quality. Wood-burning stoves and fireplaces often release high amounts of harmful particles that can potentially increase your risk of developing severe long-term health issues like lung disease and cancer.
Additionally, heating systems that use older furnaces and gas-fueled heating appliances are also considered potentially high-risk options.
Gas-powered options run the risk of releasing carbon monoxide, an odorless gas that is difficult to detect but can easily lead to suffocation. Many experts recommend using direct-vent gas appliances, which prevent these toxic gas emissions from interacting with indoor air.
Jenny Kakoudakis likes to blog about interiors. She launched award-winning Seasons in Colour in 2014 and the luxury interior design blog All The Pretty Homes in 2024. When she is not chasing criminals out of the financial system (her day job), she gets creative by redecorating her own home.
