Effect of a back massage and relaxation intervention on sleep in critically ill patients
One article on PainSci cites Richards 1998: Does Massage Therapy Work?
PainSci notes on Richards 1998:
The no-brainer conclusion: “Back massage is useful for promoting sleep in critically ill older men.” Most likely that sentence could stop at “promoting sleep” and it would still be correct, but I understand the need for precision.
original abstract †Abstracts here may not perfectly match originals, for a variety of technical and practical reasons. Some abstacts are truncated for my purposes here, if they are particularly long-winded and unhelpful. I occasionally add clarifying notes. And I make some minor corrections.
BACKGROUND: Critically ill patients are deprived of sleep and its potential healing qualities, although many receive medications to promote sleep. No one has adequately evaluated holistic nonpharmacological techniques designed to promote sleep in critical care practice.
OBJECTIVES: To determine the effects of (1) a back massage and (2) combined muscle relaxation, mental imagery, and a music audiotape on the sleep of older men with a cardiovascular illness who were hospitalized in a critical care unit.
METHODS: Sixty-nine subjects were randomly assigned to a 6-minute back massage (n=24); a teaching session on relaxation and a 7.5-minute audiotape at bedtime consisting of muscle relaxation, mental imagery, and relaxing background music (n=28); or the usual nursing care (controls, n=17). Polysomnography was used to measure 1 night of sleep for each patients. Sleep efficiency index was the primary variable of interest. One-way analysis of variance was used to test for difference in the index among the 3 groups.
RESULTS: Descriptive statistics showed improved quality of sleep among the back-massage group. Initial analysis showed a significant difference among the 3 groups in sleep efficiency index. Post hoc testing with the Duncan procedure indicated a significant difference between the back-massage group and the control group; patients in the back-massage group slept more than 1 hour long than patients in the control group. However, the variance was significantly different among the 3 groups, and reanalysis of data with only 17 subjects in each group revealed no difference among groups (P=.06).
CONCLUSIONS: Back massage is useful for promoting sleep in critically ill older men.
This page is part of the PainScience BIBLIOGRAPHY, which contains plain language summaries of thousands of scientific papers & others sources. It’s like a highly specialized blog. A few highlights:
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- Modulation in the elastic properties of gastrocnemius muscle heads in individuals with plantar fasciitis and its relationship with pain. Zhou 2020 Sci Rep.
- Association Between Plantar Fasciitis and Isolated Gastrocnemius Tightness. Nakale 2018 Foot Ankle Int.
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- The neck and headaches. Bogduk 2014 Neurol Clin.