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Lungs are affected after being corona positive. The lungs are badly damaged post covid, but they can be cured with chest physiotherapy.
Lungs are most affected by corona. In such a situation, the patient recovers from the corona, but the patients who are weak with lungs from the covid infection are not able to recover quickly. Due to the weakness in the lungs post covid, the ability of the lungs to function deteriorates. This can have an effect on breathing and oxygen levels in the body. Due to this covid infection, many patients have breathlessness and difficulty breathing. In order to avoid this problem of lungs, chest physiotherapy (post covid chest physiotherapy exercises) is necessary. Post covid chest physiotherapy is as important as treatment during covid.
How does covid affect the lungs?
The lungs get damaged in covid. When the time of recovery comes, the lungs slowly heal. In this phase, there is a contraction in the lungs. Lungs are a spongy structure. There are many holes in the spongy organ of the lungs, through which the lungs take oxygen and release carbon dioxide out. When the virus spreads to the lungs, these spongy lungs become solid like the pulp of flour. Due to this, the alveoli for inhalation and exhalation are blocked causing difficulty in breathing.
In pneumonia, the spongy structure of the lungs becomes a solid structure. But, when the recovery sets in, instead of this spongy structure, fibers get deposited in different places in the lungs. Stretching occurs in those fibers, which causes the lungs to contract. Physiotherapy involves bringing the lungs back to the state they were healthy before they were damaged.
How to do Chest Physiotherapy?
There are different methods for chest physiotherapy which are as follows-
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Chest spirometry
When the patient is sick, patting his back with his hand is beneficial. Pressure is applied on the abdomen, side, and chest bringing the lungs in from the outside. This brings out the mucus accumulated in the lungs. This is called chest catering.
An instrument is used with which the patient is asked to breathe. Gradually this process continues and progresses. This is called chest spirometry.
Chest spirometry machine helps in exercising the lungs. When the patient starts lifting all three balls with this machine, it shows that now the patient's lung capacity has become good.
Markers are attached to the second spirometry machine. Markers like 2ml, 2000ml, 3000ml are used to check the lung capacity. In this, the patient is asked to breathe inwards and see how far the patient has been able to lift the machine which checks the power and capacity of the lungs. In the initial days, the patient is able to lift it slowly, then later it increases. The target is that the patient should pick up above 1500ml.
How Chest Spirometry Helps the Lungs?
The patient is asked to do chest spirometry three or four times a day. When the patient takes a long breath inwards, the alveoli of the lungs swell due to the inhalation of oxygen. Pneumonia causes shriveled alveoli to swell. Due to this, the process of breathing in and out of the lungs becomes normal.
There are two types of muscles in the lungs. A breath is meant for inhalation, which are called inspiratory muscles. The other exhalation of breath through expiratory muscles. These muscles let the breath in and out. The process of breathing in is more difficult. It takes a lot of energy to breathe in. Therefore, to strengthen the inspiratory muscles, exercises are done with the spirometry test.
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