Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 June 1885 — How to Breathe. [ARTICLE]

How to Breathe.

One of Philadelphia’s leading physicians, a specialist in diseases of the lungs, says that imperfect respiration is at the bottom of much trouble. In such a case he shows the patient how to swell out the whole chest full and round by a deep inspiration, elevating and throwing back the shoulders; and then, when he has gotten into his lungs the last atom of air possible, to hold it in tightly for a little, and then let it off slowly, blowing out every atom of it if he possibly can by forcible expiration, drawing the shoulders forward and pressing in the chest to the smallest possible compass, thus throwing out almost all of the residual air, and all this through the nose, with- mouth tightly closed. “Let him take a half dozen or taore such forced respirations a dozen times a day,” says the doctor, “and he will soon double his vital capacity and relieve himself of most of his supposed chest trouble. Such forced respiration will compel every air cell possible to freely admit wholesome air into the little spaces and to expel it also, and some air cells that do not often perform their functions healthily will be compelled to do so.”