Comparative study of pulmonary functions in swimmers and sedentary controls

Background: Swimming has many benefits on the body. Swimming engages practically all muscle groups; hence O2 utilization for the muscle is higher in swimmers. The water pressure on the thorax makes the respiration difficult. Breathing is not as free during swimming as compared to most other types of exercises. Respiratory responses to swimming may be expected to be different from the response to many other types of exercises. Aims & Objective: To study the pulmonary functions in competitive swimmers and to compare the same with matched sedentary control group. Materials and Methods: In this study pulmonary functions such as FVC, FEV1, FEV1/FVC, MVV, PEFR parameters were studied in 45 Swimmers in the age group of 18- 25 years. These parameters were compared with those recorded in equal number of matched apparently normal healthy sedentary medical students using unpaired t test. Results: In our study a very highly significant increase (P