title: Are non-pharmacological nursing interventions for the management of pain effective?--A meta-analysis.
abstract: A meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) assessing the effectiveness of a non-pharmacological intervention on the management of pain was conducted. Forty-nine relevant primary studies were identified and retrieved. Individual mean pain scores from these studies were converted to standardized effect sizes and meta-analyses were conducted. Although there is evidence, in the form of primary studies, to suggest that non-pharmacological nursing interventions are effective in the management of pain, the 49 studies, pooled in this meta-analysis, were too heterogeneous to detect a difference between the treatment and control groups reliably. There is a need to rigorously test these interventions in the form of primary RCTs.
authors.affiliation: Lewisham Hospital NHS Trust, Health Services Research and Evaluation Unit, England.
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Sindhu
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D010146:Pain / Q000451:nursing*; D010147:Pain Measurement / Q000451:nursing; D016032:Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic; D016896:Treatment Outcome