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Health in
Hospitals
Intensive
care
Aromatherapy in intensive care
Researchers at the Royal Berkshire Hospital NHS Trust, Reading, recently broke new ground by studying the effects of aromatherapy in the intensive care unit as a means of helping to alleviate anxiety and stress.
122 patients were randomly selected to receive either massage, aromatherapy (using essential oil of lavender), or bed rest. All of the patients were assessed before and after the therapy sessions which included physiological stress indicators as well as subjective evaluations given by the patients themselves as to their levels of anxiety, mood and ability to cope with their intensive care experience.
93 patients (77%) completed the subjective assessments and whilst there was no significant difference in the physiological stress indicators between the three groups, those patients in the aromatherapy group reported significantly greater improvements in their mood and perceived levels of anxiety. patients who received aromatherapy were found to be less anxious and more positive immediately after the treatment. Although the improvements were temporary, the results revealed a demonstrable improvement in the aromatherapy group.
Dunn C; Sleep J; Collett D Sensing an improvement: an experimental study to evaluate the use of aromatherapy, massage and periods of rest in an intensive care unit. Journal of Advanced Nursing (ENGLAND) Jan 1995, 21 (1) p34-40
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Music
therapy for premature babies in intensive care
Lullaby music can help premature babies in intensive care units develop,
according to researchers at the Center for Music Research, Florida State
University, Tallahassee, USA.
The researchers assessed
the benefits of lullaby singing and multimodal stimulation on premature
infants in neonatal intensive care. 40 infants in a Level III Newborn
Intermediate Care Unit were divided into two groups of 20, pair matched on
the basis of gender, birthweight, gestational age at birth and severity of
medical complications. The babies were all (a) corrected gestational age
> 32 weeks; (b) age since birth > 10 days; and (c) weight > 1700
g, and all of the babies had been referred for developmental stimulation
by the medical staff.
Experimental infants
received reciprocal, multimodal (ATVV) stimulation paired with line
singing of Brahms' Lullaby. Stimulation was provided for 15-30 minutes,
one or two times per week from referral to discharge. Dependent variables
were (a) days to discharge, (b) weight gain/day, and (c) experimental
infants' tolerance for stimulation.
The results showed that
music and multimodal stimulation significantly benefited females' days to
discharge and increased weight gain/day for both males and females. Both
male and female infants' tolerance for stimulation showed marked and
steady increase across the stimulation intervals with females' tolerance
increasing more rapidly than males.
The study indicates that
playing a music lullaby can have a noticeable theraputic effect on
premature babies in an intensive care unit.
The effect of music and
multimodal stimulation on responses of premature infants in neonatal
intensive care . Pediatr Nurs 1998 Nov-Dec;24(6):532-8. Standley
JM
This page was last updated on 06 July 2000 16:37:52
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