Mind-body trials did not establish relief from cancer-related breathlessness
Pooled trials of qigong, yoga and breathing with relaxation found no statistically clear benefits for breathlessness, quality of life, exercise capacity or anxiety.
Based on the published abstract. The full paper may contain additional methods, results and limitations.
The 30-second takeaway
The pooled evidence did not show a statistically significant reduction in breathlessness with mind-body interventions for people with cancer. Quality of life, exercise capacity and anxiety also showed no clear improvement. These findings leave benefit uncertain: they are not proof that the approaches have no effect, especially given variation between studies and methodological concerns.
The trials varied considerably, and methodological concerns limited interpretation. The abstract does not describe comparator treatments, intervention duration or participant totals, preventing a detailed assessment of applicability.
Different practices were pooled
The review grouped qigong, yoga, and combined breathing and relaxation practices under mind-body interventions. A pooled result across these approaches does not establish how well any particular program worked for a specific cancer group.
Uncertainty around breathlessness
The breathlessness result used a standardized mean difference, allowing different measurement scales to be combined. Its confidence interval crossed zero, so the analysis did not clearly distinguish improvement from no difference or worsening.
The original publication
Mind-body interventions for cancer-related dyspnoea: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.
Papurcu A, Tang C, Cheema BS et al.
Support Care Cancer · 2025
- PubMed ID
- 41247541
- Record checked
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