TUESDAY, Sept. 8, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Laughter has been called the best medicine, but can it help you breathe better?

Yes, says a new study that found laughter therapy as effective as more traditional breathing therapies to help people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) breathe freely.

Laughing worked just as well to reduce breathing problems as pursed-lip breathing, researchers said. Pursed-lip breathing is a COPD technique in which patients are taught to breathe in through the nose and out slowly through pursed lips. The findings were reported Monday at a meeting of the European Respiratory Society in Barcelona, Spain.  

“The results of this study show that both pursed-lip breathing exercises and laughter therapy can significantly reduce the severity of breathlessness in COPD patients, and this effect was sustained, even a month after the program ended,” researcher Goncagul Aldan said in a news release. She is a lecturer and nurse with Hacettepe University Faculty of Nursing in Turkey. 

“Both interventions also showed promising results in improving overall health, suggesting that laughter therapy may be a worthwhile area for further investigation alongside pursed-lip breathing in COPD care,” Aldan said.

For the study, patients were taught how to use deliberate laughter as a breathing exercise. The technique included rhythmic clapping with vocal sounds, playful laughter exercises such as minicking a motorcycle starting, and spontaneous unforced laughter.

“COPD is a serious lung disease that makes it hard to breathe. It affects millions of people worldwide and is a leading cause of disability and death,” Aldan said. “People with COPD often feel breathless, even during simple daily activities. This reduces their quality of life and makes them increasingly dependent on others for care."

But managing COPD requires more than medication alone, she said.

“Patients need a holistic approach to help them cope with their symptoms, the physical burden of the disease and its emotional and psychological impact,” Aldan added.

In the study, one-third of 63 Turkish COPD patients were randomly assigned to laughter therapy, one-third to pursed-lip exercises and one-third to no breathing exercises at all.

People assigned to therapeutic exercises performed them three times a week for eight weeks in 30-minute sessions, researchers said.

Both types of breathing exercises helped COPD patients breathe better, results showed.

“In COPD, the airways tend to collapse during exhalation, trapping stale air inside the lungs," Aldan said. "Pursed-lip breathing creates a gentle back pressure that allows this trapped air to escape, slows the breathing rate and helps patients feel more in control of their breathing.”

Laughter may have a similar impact, along with added benefits for people with COPD, researchers found. 

“Laughter may exercise the breathing muscles, promote deeper exhalation and trigger the release of endorphins, offering both physical and emotional relief," Aldan said. "Laughter therapy aims to evoke the effects of genuine laughter in the body."

Researchers next plan to study laughter therapy on a larger scale with more patients.

“These findings offer hope that simple, low-cost techniques which patients can practice at home — without any equipment or specialist support — may reduce breathlessness and improve daily well-being,” Aldan said. “Both pursed-lip breathing exercises and laughter therapy could be valuable additions to existing COPD care, complementing medication and pulmonary rehabilitation programs.”

Dr. Marc Miravitlles, vice president of the European Respiratory Society, praised the work as a “small but well-run study.”

“These results, showing that patients can breathe more easily and feel better in general, are promising,” Miravitlles said. “Laughter therapy is simple and low-cost, meaning it could be used by anyone, anywhere in the world. We look forward to further research in this area.”

Findings presented at medical meetings should be considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.

More information

The COPD Foundation has more on breathing techniques.

SOURCE: European Respiratory Society, news release, Sept. 7, 2026