Critical Review in Qigong & Immunity Cancer Research

Abstract

Qigong, a common form of "Breathing and Relaxation Exercise", has been adopted by many Asian cancer patients as a complementary treatment in parallel with their conventional cancer management. Research has been conducted in many different centres not limited to Asian countries and reported in many scientific literatures. Most of these studies found short-term Qigong is able to achieve statistically significant clinical benefits as reported in cancer patients' selfreported quality of life including relieving chronic fatigue and many other psychological parameters. However there is limited unequivocal evidence on the clinical effects on the precise mechanism through which Qigong is able to achieve an overall general health enhancement for cancer patients. This mini-review aims to summarize the published specific immunological data about the innate as well as the adaptive anti-cancer immune bioactivities for cancer patients who practice Qigong in comparison with various control groups. We aim to relate the various biological components of the changes of specific immune populations including their number and activities, with the marked changes of the cytokine profiles as well as the circulating blood inflammation markers expression. This paper addresses the current research gap in the lack of sophisticated understanding of the mechanistic of Qigong leading to enhanced immunity. Furthermore, this review provides a map of future global collaborative efforts in conducting carefully design randomised control trials on selected commonly used Qigong exercises in cancer management.