Breathing Techniques for Serious Respiratory Illness: What a Systematic Review Found for Breathlessness and Quality of Life

Physical therapists and physical therapist assistants who see adults living with COPD, asthma or other serious respiratory illness in pulmonary rehabilitation, acute care, home health or outpatient settings, and who want to know how the randomised trial evidence on breathing techniques actually reads.

Physical therapists and physical therapist assistants. Physical therapist assistants deliver interventions under the direction and supervision of a physical therapist; evaluation, diagnosis and plan-of-care decisions remain with the physical therapist.

Intended audience

Physical Therapy

Level

Intermediate

Delivery format

Online, asynchronous, self-paced course: interactive reading with audio or video, and a scored post-test.

Based on

Based on: Burge AT, Gadowski AM, Jones A, Romero L, Smallwood NE, Ekström M, Reinke LF, Saggu R, Wijsenbeek M, Holland AE. Breathing techniques to reduce symptoms in people with serious respiratory illness: a systematic review. Eur Respir Rev. 2024;33(174). doi:10.1183/16000617.0012-2024. PMID: 39477355. PMCID: PMC11522968.

This course reports what that systematic review examined, what it found and how certain its authors were. It does not add claims from other sources, and it does not issue clinical recommendations of its own.

After completing this course, you will be able to:

1. Name the breathing techniques the review identified as having the most evidence for benefit, and the two diagnoses that made up most of the included trials.
2. State what the review reported for breathlessness, for health-related quality of life and for adverse events when breathing techniques were compared with usual care or a sham intervention.
3. Explain the main limits the authors described — including risk of bias, poorly described interventions and results that did not all point the same way — and how those limits shaped their conclusions.

1. Start Here: How This Course Works
2. Podcast: Breathing Techniques and Breathlessness — The Evidence in Brief (about nine minutes)
3. Breathlessness, Quality of Life and the Techniques Under Review
4. How the Trials Were Identified and Appraised
5. Findings: Breathlessness, Quality of Life and Adverse Events
6. Risk of Bias, Mixed Results and Other Limits
7. Pursed Lip, Diaphragmatic and Yoga Breathing in Everyday Care
8. Key Takeaways
9. Post-Test and Course Evaluation

Quinn Millington, PT, DPT, ECS is the instructor of record: the licensed clinician who reviewed this course and signed off on it. The name and credentials print on the certificate.

Disclosures. This course was developed by The ConEd Solution, which has a financial interest in its sale. No outside funding or sponsorship was received. The instructor of record has no affiliation with the authors of the source publication or their institutions.

This course awards 0.5 contact hours (30 min). How you earn them:

1. Complete the course. Every lesson, in order.
2. Pass the post-test. Score 80% or higher. Retakes are allowed.
3. Complete the evaluation. A short form rating each learning objective and the course.
4. Download your certificate. It is issued on completion and stays available in My Account.

The episode time is its measured length. Reading, post-test and evaluation times are estimates.

This course is designed to satisfy the quality requirements state boards set for continuing education. Requirements vary by state, and confirming that a course fits your renewal is up to you. Each state’s own acceptance statement is in the credit panel on this page.

1. Based on: Burge AT, Gadowski AM, Jones A, Romero L, Smallwood NE, Ekström M, Reinke LF, Saggu R, Wijsenbeek M, Holland AE. Breathing techniques to reduce symptoms in people with serious respiratory illness: a systematic review. Eur Respir Rev. 2024;33(174). doi:10.1183/16000617.0012-2024. PMID: 39477355. PMCID: PMC11522968.
2. This course reports what that systematic review examined, what it found and how certain its authors were. It does not add claims from other sources, and it does not issue clinical recommendations of its own.