Qigong

Daoyin texts and images from the Han period

Two excavated sources are often discussed as ancestors of later Chinese exercise practice. A colored silk chart from Han tomb No. 3 at Mawangdui, Changsha, unearthed in 1973, shows 44 figures in four rows of eleven. The Hunan Museum describes postures that include breathing exercises and imitations of animals such as the crane, bear and monkey, with text across 31 sections on health maintenance and therapeutic exercise.

The Yinshu, or Pulling Book, was found in tomb 247 at Zhangjiashan, Hubei, excavated in 1983 and 1984. The preliminary report dates the tomb between 186 and 156 BCE. Vivienne Lo calls the text the earliest extant treatise on daoyin, or guiding and pulling. It sets out a seasonal regimen and 41 exercises, some named for animal movements and some for joint pain or internal complaints. Lo presents daoyin as one part of a regimen that also adjusted diet, sleep and grooming.

Qigong as a twentieth-century category

Otehode and Penny argue that qigong therapy, as a named medical practice, was created in 1950s China. Their account centers on Liu Guizhen (1902-83), a local official in Hebei who reported illness in 1948 and recovery through a practice called Neiyanggong. In 1954 he founded the Tangshan Qigong Sanitorium, described as the first qigong organization in China. The authors treat the result as a break from tradition, because terms judged feudal, superstitious or religious were dropped and scientific medical theory replaced them.

The same article reports that the word qigong was not standard vocabulary in the 1950s. It appears earlier in a late Qing book chapter title and in martial arts and Daoist circles, with different senses. A medical team leader, Huang Yueting, proposed it because qi could be read as oxygen in Western medicine and as primordial qi in Chinese medicine. The authors call the name a conscious compromise, and the characters were not standardized until about 1954.

Otehode and Penny add that the Huangdi Neijing never uses the word qigong but does describe a cultivation system called daoyin tuna, and that this is the basis for the claim that qigong therapy has a history of more than two thousand years. The source does not date the Neijing, and the page makes no claim about the age of the text.

Institutionalization and later spread

After a 1955 award to the Tangshan group, qigong sanitoria opened from 1956, including Beidaihe and Shanghai. Qigong therapy received accreditation as a medical treatment from China's Ministry of Health and appeared in a national textbook on Chinese medicine. Practices from medicine, martial arts, Buddhism and Daoism were absorbed and modified in the process. Ng's review states that qigong remained veiled in secrecy and available only to the elite until the early 1980s. A 2000 letter by psychiatrist Sing Lee estimates that about 5 percent of China's population practiced it.

The word qigong and its spellings

The US National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) writes the term as qigong and gives the pronunciation as chi gong. Other romanizations appear in English, so chi kung and qi gong refer to the same practice. According to Otehode and Penny, the qi in the name was explained in the 1950s as both oxygen and primordial qi, which shows that even the founding generation gave the word more than one meaning.

Daoyin, qigong therapy and health qigong

Daoyin, meaning guiding and pulling, is the older term used in the excavated texts. Chinese medicine doctors in the early 1950s favored naqi daoyin for Neiyanggong, and the practice was also described as lianqi in martial circles and yangqi among Daoists, according to a 1983 source cited by Otehode and Penny. Qigong therapy, qigong liaofa, was the 1950s generic term for Neiyanggong and Qiangzhuanggong. NCCIH states that tai chi practiced for health is considered a form of qigong, which is why research on the two overlaps.

Movement, breath and attention

NCCIH describes qigong as combining regulation of the mind, breath and body movement, and says practitioners use it to optimize energy in the body, mind and spirit. The word energy here is the tradition's own vocabulary and is not a measured quantity. Research papers tend to name specific routines instead. A 2026 review of qigong after stroke groups trials by Baduanjin, Yijinjing, Liuzijue and daoyin-type exercises, and a 2026 network meta-analysis in cancer patients lists Baduanjin and Wuqinxi alongside general qigong.

Internal and external qigong

Most trials test qigong as exercise that participants perform themselves. A smaller group tests external qigong therapy, in which a practitioner directs qi toward a recipient. In a trial for knee osteoarthritis, two therapists delivered five to six sessions over three weeks, while a sham healer mimicked the treatment. The authors of a systematic review describe external qigong as an energy-healing intervention. Practitioners hold that the healer transmits qi, a premise that cannot be assessed by the trial outcomes reviewed here.

Medical, martial and religious contexts

The sources reviewed show qigong crossing several settings. The 1950s medical form drew on medicine, martial arts, Buddhism and Daoism, and the older word qigong circulated among martial artists and Daoists. These sources describe that history but do not document present-day martial or religious qigong schools in detail, so this page makes no claims about how those schools teach or organize practice.

Uses in 1950s sanatoria and in current research

In the 1950s, qigong therapy was applied to neurasthenia, stomach ulcers and tuberculosis, according to Otehode and Penny. In current literature, NCCIH lists studies of qigong for pain, fibromyalgia, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, Parkinson disease, high blood pressure, chronic heart failure, falls, cancer symptoms, cognition and substance use disorders. Listing a condition shows that researchers have tested qigong for it and does not indicate that the practice is effective.

Claims about external qi

Proponents of external qigong describe a healer who emits or directs qi to relieve pain and illness. A systematic review of external qigong for pain presents it as an energy-healing intervention used to prevent and treat ailments. The claim concerns an unmeasured force, so trials can test only whether sessions by a qigong healer differ in outcome from a sham, as discussed in the next section.

The Cochrane review on cardiovascular prevention

Hartley and colleagues (2015) reviewed qigong for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease. They found 11 completed randomized trials with 1,369 participants, all conducted in China, and one ongoing trial. Nine trials were published in Chinese with too little methodological detail to judge risk of bias, and the authors could not obtain clarification. Six trials gave usable blood pressure data, and no meta-analysis was performed.

Two trials reported mortality after 20 to 30 years, but the authors state that those effects cannot be attributed to qigong. The authors had very low confidence in the results, called the evidence very limited and made no practice recommendation. No included trial reported adverse events or quality of life.

Other systematic reviews

A 2015 review of qigong for hypertension pooled 20 trials with 2,349 participants and reported lower blood pressure than no intervention, but the authors found generally high risk of bias. Seventeen trials were published in Chinese, none described allocation concealment, and the authors suspected publication bias. A 2019 review of nine studies on depression found a small effect favoring qigong, with a standardized mean difference of -0.27. Every included study had high risk of performance bias, and most participants were healthy adults or had mild low mood.

A 2026 network meta-analysis of 64 trials in 4,448 cancer patients ranked Baduanjin first for anxiety and Wuqinxi first for depression, but the certainty of the network estimates ranged from moderate to very low. A 2026 review of 16 trials after stroke reported higher cognitive scores with qigong overall, while the Yijinjing subgroup was not statistically significant. NCCIH summarizes this body of work as limited, mixed or preliminary, with weak findings for knee osteoarthritis. Small samples, publication mainly in Chinese, unblinded participants and varied routines recur across these reviews, so results apply only to the routine, population and comparator studied.

Controlled studies of external qigong

A 2007 systematic review identified 141 potentially relevant studies and included five randomized trials of external qigong for pain. All five reported greater pain reduction with qigong than with their controls, and a pooled analysis of two trials (80 participants) showed a mean difference of 36.3 mm on a 100 mm pain scale. The reviewers called the evidence encouraging and requested further studies, and the small number of trials and varied controls limit the conclusion.

In a randomized trial of 112 adults with knee osteoarthritis, both the external qigong and sham groups improved. Patients treated by one healer improved more than the sham group, whereas those treated by the other healer improved about as much as the sham group, and the authors concluded that results depended on the healer. A pilot trial in 101 people recently abstinent from cocaine compared real and sham external qigong; the craving reduction had p = 0.06; depression fell more in the real group.

Exercise-related events

NCCIH states that many studies reported no negative side effects, including in older adults and people with chronic disease. In a review of adults with neck pain, side effects occurred in under 10 percent of participants and included muscle pain, soreness and headache. Reporting is thin, though: the Cochrane review found no adverse events reported in any included trial, and in the 20 hypertension trials only one mentioned an event, a case of vestibular neuronitis judged unrelated. The depression review did not extract adverse-event data. In the cancer network meta-analysis, 13 of 64 trials reported adverse events, and none was serious.

Qigong deviation and mental disorders

Psychiatric literature describes episodes labeled qigong deviation, or zou huo ru mo. Sing Lee reports that the Chinese Classification of Mental Disorders lists qigong-induced mental disorder as a culture-related condition, thought to arise from improper practice or from failing to stop properly, mainly in psychologically vulnerable people. He notes that the proportion of practitioners affected is unknown, that many cases appeared in Chinese psychiatric journals, and that brief episodes may never reach medical attention.

Ng's review of Chinese and English literature found a conspicuous lack of controlled data on qigong and mental health. It states that practiced inappropriately, qigong may induce abnormal psychosomatic responses and even mental disorders, but that a causal link is difficult to establish. Many so-called qigong-induced psychoses may be better described as qigong-precipitated psychoses, in which the practice acts as a stressor in vulnerable people. Reports are largely case series and reviews, and the sources do not give incidence rates.

Suitability, instructors and care boundaries

NCCIH reports no research on the safety of qigong during pregnancy and advises people who are pregnant to consult a health care provider first, since some movements may need to be avoided or modified. It also states that qigong instructors are not required to be licensed and that no national standard for qigong certification exists, so training varies by organization; it suggests asking about an instructor's training and experience. This page found no professional register for qigong instructors. Qigong should not be used to delay or replace diagnosis or treatment, and anyone who develops disturbing perceptions or distress during intensive practice should seek medical advice.