Effect of Active and Passive Stretching on Symptoms in Stable COPD: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a chronic lung disease with high mortality and disability rate. It caused the progressive airflow obstruction along with the change of relevant soft tissue. Stretching could lengthen the shorten respiratory muscle and increase its flexibility. Objectives: To investigate the effectiveness of stretching on the COPD patients. Methods: The PRISMA guideline was used to perform the review. We searched on six online databases (Web of Science, PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, CNKI and Wanfang Database) from inception until March 2022. The quality of the studies was appraised by PEDro scale. The pooled effect sizes of exercise capability, lung function parameters, dyspnea, psychological status and quality of life were reported. Result: Of 422 studies, 11 studies (424 participants) met the inclusion criteria. The overall effect size of the 6MWT showed statistical difference between stretching group and the control group (P<0.00001). Among the lung function parameters, only respiratory rate (RR) and expiratory time (Te) showed superior statistical effect. The data about the psychological state, dyspnea and quality of life were too scant to conclude. Conclusion: Stretching seemed to have strong effectiveness on improving the exercise capacity, and the breathing temporal parameters could be changed through stretching.