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. 2014 Fall;13(4):1257-61.

Effects of Inhalation of Lavender Essential Oil on Open-heart Surgery Pain

Armaiti Salamati  1 , Soheyla Mashouf  1 , Faezeh Sahbaei  1 , Faraz Mojab  2
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Effects of Inhalation of Lavender Essential Oil on Open-heart Surgery Pain

Armaiti Salamati et al. Iran J Pharm Res. 2014 Fall.

Abstract

This study evaluated the effects of inhalation of lavender essential oil on the pain of open-heart surgery. The main complaint of patients after open-heart surgery is chest pain. Due to the side effects of opioids, it is important to use a non-invasive way to effectively relieve pain including aromatherapy with analgesics. This study was a clinical single-blind trial and was conducted on 40 patients who had open-heart surgery in the cardiac ICU of 2 Hospitals of Tehran University of Medical Sciences, 2012. Criteria included: full consciousness, spontaneous breathing ability and not using synthetic opioids within 2 hours before extubation. After extubation, the patients were asked to mark the intensity of their pain using the visual analogue scale. Then, a cotton swab which was impregnated with 2 drops of lavender essential oil 2% was placed in their oxygen mask, and they got breath for 10 minutes. 30 minutes after aromatherapy, they were asked to re-mark their pain intensity. The level of patient's pain before and after aroma therapy were compared. The pain mean level before and after inhaling lavender essential oil was 5.60 (SD = 2.262) and 4.98 (SD = 2.293), respectively (p-value>0.05). Therefore, there is no significant difference and the result of study proves that lavender essential oil inhalation has no effect on reducing the pain of open-heart surgery.

Keywords: Aromatherapy; Control of pain; Lavender; Open-heart surgery.

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Figures

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Figure 1
Follow-up of patients
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