Short term Effectiveness of Structured Exercise Protocol on Respiratory Parameters in subjects with COVID

Abstract

Few studies have demonstrated that subjects with Covid have breathless at rest, fever, sore throat and other pneumonia like symptoms and are known to respond effectively towards Drug therapy which boosts their immunity. Physiotherapy is very well studied to improve immunity by imposing various exercises on the affected part, thus strengthening that part. Deep breathing and chest expansion exercises are known to be effective in treating subjects with such symptoms. Various exercises have been demonstrated for subjects with Covid. According to authors’ knowledge there is very less number of studies demonstrating the effectiveness of the exercise protocol formed for Covid subjects. The objective of the study is to investigate the short term effectiveness of Structured Exercise Protocol on respiratory parameters in subjects with Covid. It is an experimental study conducted on 50 Covid positive subjects who were given regular chest physiotherapy including deep breathing exercises, segmental breathing exercises, chest expansion exercises and dedicated prone lying. The results demonstrated that: modified Borg’s scale of dyspnoea, SPO2, Respiratory rate, Xray changes, Heart rate and number of active cough extraction showed significant changes. Dedicated prone lying along with regular chest physiotherapy showed great improvement in respiratory parameters.