Retrospective survey on therapeutic efficacy of Qigong in Korea

Qigong is a complementary intervention for preventing and curing disease, and protecting and improving health through regulation of body and mind. Recently, we have been studying the psychoneuroimmunological effects of Qigong on the promotion of health. However, there are not many studies on the therapeutic efficacy of Qigong on various symptoms in Korea, hence the need to survey the clinical efficacy of Qigong. To evaluate the impact of Qigong in health care we categorized its effectiveness on the basis of ten years of subjects' memoranda. Among the 768 subjects, the motivation for doing Qigong was mostly to attend to health problems (81.5%), and males were more likely to use Qigong than females. The most improved symptoms were associated with psychological and musculoskeletal problems. Furthermore 66.9% of subjects reported improvements of perceived physical health and 40.3% of perceived psychological health. Other symptoms reduced by Qigong were pain (43.1%), fatigue (22.1%), and insomnia (8.7%). Wound healing was also surveyed (n = 332), and 84% of respondents reported improvement in recovery time, 66.6% reported reduced inflammation after Qigong and 50.3% reported no scarring as compared to before. In addition, 59.9% of respondents reported an increase in resistance to the common cold after four months of Qigong. The limitation of the study is that it is a retrospective survey on the basis of trainees' experiences of Qigong. Although this may constitute a potential bias, the study despite its limitations does provide precious empirical evidence of the effectiveness of Qigong.
PMID: 14696684