Along with your inhalers and medications, breathing exercises can help to reduce asthma symptoms and is highly recommended for people with asthma. Certain breathing techniques taught by a respiratory physiotherapist, an expert who can teach you breathing exercises.You may need several appointments to learn these exercises and how to incorporate them into your daily routine. A physical exam is required to identify if you are using all your lungs and your diaphragm, not just the upper airways. This treatment aims to correct your breathing, which may be too fast or too shallow. It will relax the muscle involved in the process of respiration and can make your lungs more efficient.
Retrain breathing patterns with breathing exercises
Having asthma means narrowing of the lungs, making it hard to catch your breath. People buy asthma medication like inhaled corticosteroid and beta-agonists help open their airways. Buy asthma products online to get the best price for the products. For some, medications might not be enough to control symptoms; they need additional treatments. For those who are looking to boost the drug treatment should try breathing exercises.
Until recently, the treatment technique doesn’t come in the limelight because there wasn’t enough evidence to show that it works. Yet more clinical studies reveal the benefits of breathing exercise on overall quality of life. Based on current evidence, breathing exercise can provide additional therapy to medication and other asthma treatments like inhalers.
There are many different breathing exercises which your respiratory physiotherapist can teach you. Some of these include:
- Pursed lip breathing- It is a technique used to relieve one of the major symptoms of asthma, shortness of breath. Practice it by first breathing slowly through the nose with pursed lip and mouth closed. You need to purse your lips as if you are about to whistle. After a few seconds, breathe out through pursed lips.
- Diaphragmatic breathing- Diaphragmatic breathing also called as belly breathing. In this, you need to breathe from the region around your diaphragm (a dome-shaped muscle below your lungs that helps to breathe), rather than the chest. The technique is extremely beneficial in strengthening your diaphragm, slowing breathing, and decreasing the body’s need for oxygen. Practice it by lying down on your back with your knees bent, and start by breathing in through your nose. Put your hands lightly on your stomach to see your belly rising and falling while breathing. Breathe out through your mouth at least twice as long as you inhale. Make sure your neck and shoulders are relaxed during practice.
- Nasal breathing- Another breathing technique to reduce asthma symptoms. Studies revealed that mouth breathing contributes to severe asthma symptoms. While breathing through the nose, it adds humidity to the air, which is helpful in reducing asthma symptoms.
- Buteyko breathing- the breathing technique is created by Konstantin Buteyko. This breathing technique is all about breathing slower and deeper. Buteyko has been shown to improve asthma symptoms and reduce the need for medication and inhalers. However, to improve lung function, medications are a necessary thing.
- Yoga breathing- Yoga breathing involves deep breathing exercise, which has been found to improve asthma symptoms as well as lung functions.
- The Papworth technique- It includes different types of breathing with relaxation techniques. It makes you learn how to breathe slowly and steadily from the diaphragm and through the nose. While practicing kit, you also learn how to control stress, so it doesn’t affect breathing. Clinical studies suggest that this breathing method ease asthma symptoms and improves the quality of life of people living with asthma.
