June 27, 2010

Massage Therapy Found to Reduce Pain During Labor

Researchers recently compared massage and music therapy to relieve the severity of labor pain. One hundred and one women who were hospitalized for vaginal delivery were recruited and randomly stratified into two groups of either massage (n = 51) or music (n = 50) therapies, according to a report published on www.pubmed.gov.

"Painkillers have previously been used for childbearing women, but nowadays, owing to some well-known limitations and serious side effects, nonpharmacologic methods such as massage and music therapies are being broadly recommended," the report noted. "The present clinical trial was conducted to compare the effects of massage and music therapies on the severity of labor …"

Pain was measured using the visual analog scale and the two groups were compared in terms of pain severity before and after the interventions.

The results showed the women in the massage therapy group had a lower level
of pain compared with those in the music therapy group (p = 0.009). A significant difference was observed between the two groups in terms of pain severity after intervention (p = 0.01), the report noted. Agonizing, or most severe, labor pain was significantly relieved after massage therapy (p = 0.001).

"Massage therapy was an effective method for reducing and relieving labor pain compared with music therapy and can be clinically recommended as an alternative, safe and affordable method of pain relief where using either pharmacological or nonpharmacological methods are optional," the researchers, from Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, Iran, noted.

First seen HERE:

1 comment:

  1. Massage therapy can be one of the best choices for the women suffering from pregnancy. Even now we can have the research figures showing that women having massage suffer from less pain during pregnancy other than the women lack of any massage.

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