Exercise and COPD

Learning the basics of exercise is important for everyone, but especially for people with COPD. Learn the basics of exercise to help keep yourself healthy.

For people with COPD who expend extra energy just to breathe, regular exercise can improve the body's ability to utilize oxygen. Low-impact activities, such as walking, place minimum stress on the joints and are typically easier for COPD patients to perform. Learn more about how to implement a simple walking program into your daily life.

Increasing your flexibility not only helps to prevent joint stiffness, but helps to improve your posture and balance. Learn 4 ways to increase your flexibility.

Pulmonary rehabilitation is becoming widely recognized as an essential part of a COPD treatment plan. Pulmonary rehabilitation uses a multidisciplinary approach that covers all aspects of COPD management, including education, exercise, relaxation, breathing techniques, nutritional advice, emotional support and the development of coping skills.

Functional Fitness of COPD is an exercise video created by Suzanne Andrews designed to help COPD and asthma patients achieve fitness and improve their quality of life. Learn more about Functional Fitness.

Obesity and COPD often go hand-in-hand. Share your experience of how obesity has negatively impacted your lung disease.

Learn how to increase the flexibility of your legs by doing a simple quadriceps stretch.

Learn how to increase the flexibility in your calves by performing the calf stretch.

Shoulder rolls help by increasing flexibility, preventing joint stiffness and improving posture and balance. Learn how to increase the flexibility of your shoulders with shoulder rolls.

Learn how to prevent neck stiffness with the head tilt.

Because exercising with COPD can be challenging, finding the best workout program for you is the key to sticking to it. Here are the top 10 COPD exercise programs for the health-conscious COPD patient.

Some pulmonary rehab exercises can be done at home, under the direction of your health care provider. Learn more about pulmonary rehab exercises.