Comparison between massage and music therapies to relieve the severity of labor pain.
BACKGROUND
During labor, women experience a high level of intense, stressful and steady pain that may negatively affect both mothers and neonates. 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 present clinical trial was conducted to compare the effects of massage and music therapies on the severity of labor pain in the Ilam province of western Iran.


METHODS
Overall, 101 primigravidae who were hospitalized for vaginal delivery were recruited and randomly stratified into two groups of either massage (n = 51) or music (n = 50) therapies. Pain was measured using the visual analog scale and the two groups were compared in terms of pain severity before and after the interventions.


RESULTS
Mothers 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). Agonizing, or most severe, labor pain was significantly relieved after massage therapy (p = 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
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.
Taghinejad
Hamid
H
Ilam University of Medical Sciences, Ilam, Iran.
Delpisheh
Ali
A
Suhrabi
Zeinab
Z
D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007492:Iran; D048949:Labor Pain / Q000628:therapy*; D007743:Labor, Obstetric / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology; D008405:Massage; D009147:Music Therapy; D010147:Pain Measurement; D017288:Pain Threshold / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology; D011247:Pregnancy; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D055815:Young Adult