The effectiveness of massage on labor pain and duration of labor: Systematic Review

Document Type : Review Article

Authors

1 PhD student in Reproductive Health, Student Research Committee, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Shahroud University of Medical Sciences, Shahroud, Iran.

2 M.Sc. student of Nursing, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Shahid Bahshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.

3 Associate Professor, Department of Reproductive Health, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Shahroud University of Medical Sciences, Shahroud, Iran.

Abstract

Introduction: Massage is proposed as a non-pharmacological methods of pain relief, but the effectiveness of massage in obstetric interventions is not clear. This systematic review was performed with aim to evaluate the effectiveness of massage for pain relief and duration of labor based on systematic review of clinical trials.
Methods: In this study, a systematic review of all published trials and pilot studies as Persian and English in the world and all the articles published from 1990 to June 15 of 2015 were studied. Cochrane, Science direct, PubMed, Scopus, Sid, Iran medex, Iran doc, Magiran, Google scholar database were used to search the studies. The keywords were as follows: massage AND labor pain, pregnancy AND massage, touch AND labor pain, complementary medicine AND labor pain. Two researchers simultaneously performed the studies searching. To increase the validity and reliability of the study, two persons separately evaluated the quality of articles and Jadad   scale was used to evaluate the papers.
Results: in this study, 18 clinical trials were evaluated. After evaluation by Jadad scale, 7 studies with score of ≥ 3 were enrolled and others were excluded. In this studies, the intensity of pain in the intervention group was less than the control group, and in two studies, duration of labor was less than the control group.
Conclusion: This study slowed credible evidence for massage in labor pain relief. The massage can be used to reduce labor pain, however, to use this method in order to reduce the duration of labor, there were no sufficient studies with high quality, and the performed studies were moderate to high in terms of bias. Therefore, massage is not recommended to reduce the duration of labor in this area.

Keywords

References

  1. Bonica JJ. The pain of childbrith. 2nd ed. Edinburgh: Llivingstone; 1988.
  2. Group TCD. Midwifery management of pain in labor. J Nurs Midwifery 1998; 43(2):77-82.
  3. Brown ST, Douglas C, Flood LP. Woman’s evaluation of intrapartum non pharmacological pain relief methods used during labor. J prenat educ 2001; 10(3):20-8.
  4. Salari S, Pilevarzadeh M, Shafiee N. [The effects of short-term myofascial trigger massage therapy on physiological parameters and relaxation reactions]. J Sabzevar Univ Med Sci 2005; 11(4):27-32. (Persian.(
  5. Sinha AG. Principles and practices of therapeutic massage. 1st ed. New Delhi: Medical Publishers; 2001.
  6. Field T, Hernandez-Reif M, Taylor S, Quintion O, Burman I. Labor pain is reduced by message therapy. J Psychosomat obstet Gynecol 1997; 18(4):286-91.
  7. Melzack R, Wall PD. Textbook of pain. Edinburg: Churchill Livingston; 1999. P. 662.
  8. Lowdermilk DL, Perry SE, Bobak IM. Maternity and women’s health care. 7th ed. St. Louise: Mosby; 2000. P. 245.
  9. Field T, Massage therapy and Benefits. Available at: URL: http://www.alayinonofhands.com/index.htm; 2005.
  10. Williams J, Mitchell M. Midwifery managers’ views about the use of complementary therapies in the maternity services. Complement Ther Clin Pract 2007; 13(2):129-35.
  11. Nabb MT, Kimber L, Haines A, McCourt C. Does regular massage from late pregnancy to birth decrease maternal pain perception during labour and birth?--A feasibility study to investigate a programme of massage, controlled breathing and visualization, from 36 weeks of pregnancy until birth. Complement Ther Clin Pract 2006; 12(3):222-31.
  12. Field T. Pregnancy and labor massage. Expert Rev Obstet Gynecol 2010; 5(2):177-81.
  13. Huntley AL, Coon JT, Ernst E. Complementary and alternative medicine for labor pain: A systematic review. Am J Obstet Gynecol 2004; 191(1):36-44.
  14. Simkin PP, O’hara M. Nonpharmacologic relief of pain during labor: systematic reviews of five methods. Am J Obstet Gynecol 2002; 186(5):S131-59.
  15. Smith CA, Levett KM, Collins CT, Jones L. Massage, reflexology and other manual methods for pain management in labour. Cochrane Database Sys Rev 2012; 2:CD009290.
  16. Jadad AR, Moore RA, Carroll D, Jenkinson C, Reynolds DJM, Gavaghan DJ, et al. Assessing the quality of reports of randomized clinical trials: is blinding necessary? Control Clin Trial 1996; 17(1):1-12.
  17. Phipps WJ, Monahan FD, Sands JK, Marek JF. Marianne neighbors medical surgical nursing health and illness perspectives. 7th ed. St.Louis: Mosby; 2003.
  18. Zahra A, Leila MS. Lavender aromatherapy massages in reducing labor pain and duration of labor: A randomized controlled trial. Africa J Pharm Pharmacol 2013; 7(8):426-30.
  19. Chang MY, Chen CH, Huang KF. A comparison of massage effects on labor pain using the McGill Pain Questionnaire. J Nurs Res 2006; 14(3):190-7.
  20. Hashemi Z, Badakhsh M, Shahdadi H, Heydri M, Hashemi N. [The effect of massage on intensity and duration of labor pain in primigravida women in Zabol Amiralmoemenin Hospital]. J Zabol Univ Med Sci 2012; 4(1):85-93. (Persian).
  21. Pilevarzadeh M, Salari S, Shafiei N. Effect of massage on reducing pain and anxiety during labor. J Reprod Infertil 2002; 3(4):43-6. (Persian).
  22. Foroud A, Foroud A, Mehdiipour S. [The effects of breathing patterns and massage on the pain and perception of labor in primiparous women]. Shahrekord Univ Med Sci J 2005; 7(4):70-7. (Persian.)
  23. Tork ZS, Honarjou M, Jannesari SH, Alavi MH. [Effects of massage on delivery satisfaction in primiparous women referring to Ayatollah Shaheed Hospital in Isfahan]. Res Med 2007; 16(53):3-10. (Persian).
  24. Safarzadeh A, KhodaKarami V, Fathizadeh V. Effects of massage therapy on labor pain in primiparous women. J Med Sci 2008; 9(4):20-5.
  25. Kaviani M, Gholami J, Azima SN. The Comparison of two methods of massage on pain during childbirth in nulliparous women. J Obstet Gynecol Infertil 2012; 37(5):43-8. (Persian).
  26. Kashaniyan M, Shahali SH, Bahasadri SH. The effect of San-yin-jiao (SP6) massage on active phase in nulliparous women. J Urmia Univ Med Sci 2011; 21(4):361-7. (Persian.(
  27. Kamalifard M, Shahnazi M, Melli MS, Allahverdizadeh S, Toraby S, Ghahvechi A. The efficacy of massage therapy and breathing techniques on pain intensity and physiological responses to labor pain. J Car Sci 2012; 1(2):73-8. (Persian.(
  28. Mortazavi SH, Khaki S, Moradi R, Heidari K, Vasegh Rahimparvar SF. Effects of massage therapy and presence of attendant on pain, anxiety and satisfaction during labor. Arch Gynecol Obstet 2012; 286(1):19-23.
  29. Hosseini S, Asadi N, Zareei F. Investigating the effect of massage therapy on labor in the active stage of first labor. J Nurs Res 2014; 9(1):25-32.
  30. Serashti M, Asafi F, Shabaniyan M. Effect of patadin and massage on pain and duration of labor. IJOGI 2013; 16(8):6-16. (Persian.(
  31. Janssen P, Shroff F, Jaspar P. Massage therapy and labor outcomes: a randomized controlled trial. Int J Ther Massage Bodywork 2012; 5(4):15-20.
  32. Kimber L, McNabb M, Mc Court C, Haines A, Brocklehurst P. Massage or music for pain relief in labour: A pilot randomised placebo controlled trial. Eur J Pain 2008; 12(8):961-9.
  33. Abasi Z, Abedian Z, Hasanpour Azghadi SB, Fadaei A, Esmaeili H. [Study of the effects of massage therapy on the labor intensity fatigue]. J Sabzevar Univ Med Sci 2007; 14(3):172-8. (Persian).
  34. Khodakarami N, Safarzadeh A, Fathizadeh N. The effects of massage therapy on labour pain severity and pregnancy outcome. Eur J pain 2006; 10(suppl. S1):S214.
  35. Chang MY, Wang SY, Chen CH. Effects of massage on pain and anxiety during labour: a randomized controlled trial in Taiwan. J Adv Nurs 2002; 38(1):68-73.
  36. Gallo RBS, Santana LS, Ferreira CHJ, Marcolin AC, Polineto OB, Duarte G, et al. Massage reduced severity of pain during labour: a randomized trial. J Physiother 2013; 59(2):109-16.
  37. Taghinejad H, Delpisheh A, Suhrabi Z. Comparison between massage and music therapies to relieve the severity of labor pain. Womens Health (Lond Engl) 2010; 6(3):377-81.
  38. Higgins JP. Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews of interventions. Chichester, England: Wiley-Blackwell; 2013.
  39. Group EPOC. Effective practice and organization of care group. Available at: URL: http://www.epoc.uottawa.ca/checklist; 2005.
  40. Chalmers TC, Matta RJ, Smith H Jr, Kunzler AM. Evidence favoring the use of anticoagulants in the hospital phase of acute myocardial infarction. N Engl J Med 1977; 297(20):1091-6.
  41. Schulz KF, Chalmers I, Hayes RJ, Altman DG. Empirical evidence of bias. Dimensions of methodological quality associated with estimates of treatment effects in controlled trials. JAMA 1995; 273(5):408-12.
  42. McQuay H, Carroll D, Moore A. Variation in the placebo effect in randomized controlled trials of analgesics: all is as blind as it seems. Pain 1996; 64(2):331-5.
  43. Ganji Z, karamat A, Ahmad SM. Effect of acupressure on labor pain relief: a systematic review of clinical trials. Iran J Obstet Gynecol Infertil 2014; 17(119):8-17.
  44. Golyan Tehrani S, Vasegh Rahimparvar F, Mehran AB, Nickhah E. [The investigation of transcendental meditation effects on pain and length of active phase of labor in primiparous women]. Hayat 2006; 12(3):51-61. (Persian).

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics