Professor John Dickinson is an internationally recognised sport and exercise scientist whose work is helping to improve how breathing problems linked to exercise are understood, diagnosed and managed. He has more than 20 years of experience working across high-performance sport, respiratory health, clinical practice and applied research. His expertise has supported more than 2,000 elite athletes across football, rugby, cycling and Olympic and Paralympic sport, helping athletes and teams prepare to compete successfully at Olympic Games, World Championships and other major international events.
He graduated with a first-class BSc in Sports Science from the University of Wales, Bangor, and completed a PhD at Brunel University on the prevalence, diagnosis and treatment of exercise-induced asthma in elite athletes. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences (CASES) and has been a CASES-accredited Sport and Exercise Scientist since 2006.
Professor Dickinson began his career at the Olympic Medical Institute and the English Institute of Sport, where he investigated respiratory problems in elite athletes and supported respiratory screening for British Olympic teams. He has since worked with athletes preparing for multiple Summer and Winter Olympic Games and major international championships. This experience has given him a detailed understanding of how breathing difficulties can affect performance, confidence and quality of life, as well as the practical support required to help people overcome them.
He has translated this expertise from elite sport into clinical and community-facing work with people experiencing asthma, exercise-induced bronchoconstriction, dysfunctional breathing, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and long COVID-related breathlessness. Since joining the University of Kent in 2012, he has led the Exercise Respiratory Clinic, which provides specialist assessment, treatment, breathing-pattern training and support for athletes, patients and practitioners. His work brings together research, clinical practice and real-world problem solving to ensure that advances in respiratory science benefit the people who need them.
Professor Dickinson is also committed to educating the next generation of sports scientists. He embeds his experience of elite sport, clinical practice and applied research into his teaching across exercise physiology, athlete support, human anatomy and physiology, and student research projects. This enables students to connect scientific principles with the complex decisions faced by athletes, patients and practitioners.
Alongside his teaching and research, Professor Dickinson has held senior leadership roles in graduate research, impact and engagement, recruitment, admissions and outreach. He is a consultant exercise respiratory physiologist, an external doctoral examiner, and Chair of the CASES Outreach Panel. He has edited the practitioner book Complete Guide to Respiratory Care in Athletes and regularly contributes to professional training, public engagement and national and international media.
Professor Dickinson’s research focuses on respiratory health and performance in athletes and patients. His work addresses the ways in which breathing problems can affect exercise capacity, health, wellbeing and sporting performance, and how these problems can be more effectively diagnosed, treated and managed.
A key focus of his research is exercise-induced bronchoconstriction and asthma in athletes. He has investigated the prevalence, diagnosis and treatment of these conditions across a wide range of sports and performance levels, working with elite athletes, national teams and physically active people. His research has contributed to improved approaches for identifying respiratory problems that may otherwise be overlooked or misdiagnosed, helping athletes to access appropriate treatment while supporting safe and effective participation in sport.
Professor Dickinson also leads research into dysfunctional breathing and breathing-pattern disorders. This work explores how breathing changes during rest and exercise, how abnormal breathing patterns can contribute to breathlessness and reduced performance, and how they can be assessed and retrained. He is particularly interested in developing practical, non-invasive methods for monitoring respiratory mechanics and providing feedback to support breathing-pattern training.
His research also examines the relationship between respiratory medication and athletic performance. This includes investigating the effects of inhaled asthma medications on exercise capacity, sprint performance, fatigue and recovery, as well as the implications for anti-doping policy and the fair and safe use of medication in sport. His work brings together exercise physiology, respiratory medicine and sports performance to address questions that are important to athletes, clinicians, coaches and governing bodies.
A further strand of Professor Dickinson’s work explores how environmental exposures affect airway health and respiratory function. This includes the impact of air quality, pollution, environmental tobacco smoke and other challenging environmental conditions on athletes, patients and physically active populations. He is interested in how environmental factors may influence respiratory symptoms, exercise tolerance, airway inflammation and long-term health, and in developing strategies to help people remain active in environments that may place additional demands on the respiratory system.
Professor Dickinson’s research is strongly translational. He works with clinical, sporting and technology partners to ensure that new knowledge can be applied in real-world settings. Current and recent projects have included AI-enabled early respiratory disease screening, respiratory sensing technologies, breathing-pattern assessment and retraining, airway health in athletes with asthma, and respiratory support for people experiencing chronic breathlessness, including those with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and long COVID.
Through the University of Kent Exercise Respiratory Clinic, his research is closely connected to clinical practice and athlete support. This allows research findings to inform assessment, treatment, practitioner education and patient care, while ensuring that research questions are grounded in the experiences of the people who use respiratory services or need to perform at their best.
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