Efficacy And Feasibility Of Bigu Intervention On Selected Physical Outcome Measures Among Individuals With Obesity

Abstract

Bigu is a comprehensive health care technique based on the Chinese traditional health preservation method, including fasting, Qigong, and Chinese medicine. PURPOSE: To explore the efficacy and feasibility of a 7-day Bigu intervention on selected physical outcome measures among individuals with obesity. METHODS: Twenty-three participants, 11 male, and 12 female (age: 31.65±10.38 yrs; body height: 169.48±9.01 cm; body mass: 98.26±17.14 kg) were enrolled in the comprehensive 7-day intervention of Bigu, which consists of 1) fasting: drinking plenty of water but no food, except some fruits, such as grapes and apples. 2) Qigong exercise: including stretching exercise; eight sections of brocade for 90-minute daily under the instructions of Qigong master. 3) Chinese herb: Linggui Zhugan decoction as daily drink. Before and after the Bigu intervention, the outcome measures were: body weight, body fat, fat-free body weight, waist circumference, heart rate, blood pressure, and blood glucose. The paired test was employed to examine the differences of the outcome measures before and after the Bigu intervention. RESULTS: After the Bigu intervention, the body weight (Pretest: 98.26±17.14 vs Posttest: 92.77±16.24, p<.01), BMI (Pretest: 34.35±3.73 vs Posttest: 32.37±3.58, p<.01), waist circumference (Pretest: 110.83±10.47 vs Posttest: 106.35±10.01, p<.01) and body fat (Pretest: 41.91±8.42 vs Posttest: 40.79±8.57, p<.01) of the participants were significantly decreased. Heart rate and blood pressure remained no change, however, the skeletal muscle (Pretest: 33.32±6.45 vs Posttest: 31.60±6.61, p<.01) and fat-free body weight (Pretest: 59.28±10.66 vs Posttest: 56.28±11.02, p<.01) were significantly decreased. The blood glucose (Pretest: 5.69±2.28 vs Posttest: 3.82±1.34, p<.01) drops significantly within normal physiological range. CONCLUSIONS: Bigu may effectively help individuals with obesity to relieve obesity and control body weight and could be a feasible exercise for the individuals with obesity, however, there may be a risk of losing fat-free body weight during Bigu intervention. How to prevent the loss of fat-free body weight in Bigu intervention would warrant for future research.