Resistance training helpful for lung patients

People with chronic lung disease like emphysema or bronchitis can strengthen their arms and legs with resistance training, and this strength helps them perform everyday tasks more easily.

Rehabilitation programmes are intended to help people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), who often experience loss of muscle strength and fatigue, learn to exercise safely. There has been a growing emphasis in such programmes on progressive resistance training, in which a person moves increasingly heavy weights to improve their strength. To assess the benefits and risks these programmes have for people suffering with lung diseases, researchers analysed eighteen controlled trails (including 10 trails published in the last five years).

Small but significant increases in strength of arm and leg muscles were seen after short-term progressive resistance training. Five of the studies included in their analysis looked at cycling endurance. When compared to no exercise at all, cycling offered some endurance benefit, but aerobic training was more beneficial, and it wasn't clear whether combining the two types of exercise offered additional benefit.

The four trials that looked at measures of daily function showed benefits for stair climbing and the speed at which a person was able to rise from a chair, and these benefits were greater than those seen with aerobic training. But the design of these trials meant they could have overestimated the benefits of exercise, noted the researchers.

The above findings indicate that exercises with resistance bands, free weights, and other simple equipment could be helpful for patients with COPD.