Estimation of Inspiratory Muscle Strength in Normal Healthy Population and Its Correlation with Selected Physical Traits

Introduction The chief inspiratory muscle i. e. diaphragm is not used to its full potential in most of the adults, which may get weakened due to sedentary lifestyles and many other reasons. The objective of the present study was to investigate the estimation of the inspiratory muscle strength in normal healthy population and to find out its correlations with the selected physical traits. Materials and Methods The study was conducted on purposively selected 816 healthy college students (483 males and 333 females) of Khalsa College, Amritsar, India, aged 17-26 years. The subjects underwent an assessment including the measurements of the maximal inspiratory pressure, measurement of height, weight, chest circumference, neck circumference, biacromial breadth and trunk length. Age of the subjects was confirmed from their respective dates of birth from the college records. Results The results of the study showed significant differences between the male of female students for all the variables (p 0.001) estimated by one way analysis of variance. Both in male and female students, , significant correlations (p 0.001) of inspiratory muscle strength with the selected physical traits were found. Conclusion The conclusion drawn from the study results stated that the inspiratory muscle strength of normal healthy subjects was reported to be significantly varied in the males and females and was significantly correlated to the studied physical traits of the subjects.