What is diaphragmatic breathing?

Diaphragmatic breathing is the most natural and efficient way we can produce stabilization to, essentially, our entire body. It is the process of properly utilizing our diaphragm to breathe and brace, which we are born doing subconsciously, but all too often stop doing properly, resulting in higher susceptibility to injury. When we take a breath in, our diaphragm should descend, and in doing so, create intra-abdominal pressure by pushing everything in our abdomen down against our pelvic floor and out which we brace our “core” muscles against.

Being able to keep the diaphragm descended to maintain pressurization and stabilization becomes very challenging to relearn after years of diaphragmatic inactivity. Research has shown that diaphragmatic training produces better outcomes for low back pain when incorporated into a rehab program (1). At Ocean Health Center, we regularly educate and retrain patients on how to properly perform and integrate diaphragmatic breathing and bracing. In doing so, we see better outcomes and less office visits needed. Learning how to breathe properly may sound silly and primitive, but its impacts are so big, it shouldn’t be taken lightly.