ABSTRACT
Background:During exercise, the expiratory phase plays an equally important role in improving endurance as it helps in reducing the exercise-induced breathlessness. Therefore this study aims at specifically strengthening the expiratory muscles to study the effect of expiratory muscle strengthening on exercise-induced breathlessness. Aims and objectives: To evaluate the effect of 4 weeks of expiratory muscle strengthening on exercise-induced breathlessness in normal individuals. Methodology:Study was carried out on a total of 13 subjects ranging in the age group of 20-35yrs, where pre-intervention the Maximum Expiratory Pressure (MEP) and 1.5mile walk distance was calculated after which the subjects underwent a 4 week intervention protocol using Expiratory Muscle Strength Trainer 150 ( EMST-150) where the subjects performed 25 training breaths in one session where there were a total of 5 sessions in a day, 5days/week for a total of 4 weeks. Post the intervention the MEP and 1.5mile walk values were recalculated and compared to check for the difference. Result:Data was analyzed in terms of the mean difference. Statistically significant change was seen in the MEP and 1.5 mile walk test values post-intervention, i.e at the end of 4 weeks, where the values obtained were, MEP : pre –77.537 ±13.67 and post –88.063 ±18.39 with a p-value of 0.0019 , 1.5 mile walk(vo2max.) : pre –35.810 ±14.56 and post –39.810 ±11.8 with a p-value of 0.0038 and RPE: pre –3.80 ±0.5 and post –1.7 ±0.5 with a p-value of 0.0057, thereby proving a statically significant improvement in the outcome measures. Conclusion: The study concludes that Expiratory muscle strengthening improves the maximum expiratory strength thereby reducing the exercise-induced breathlessness leading to an improvement in the endurance level.