Positive Health Online

Abstract

WILKINSON and colleagues, Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Unit, Royal Free and University College Medical School, Department of Mental Health Sciences, Cancer Research UK London Psychosocial Group, Institute of Psychiatry, London, United Kingdom, have carried out a randomized controlled trial of aromatherapy massage in patients with cancer.

Background

The aim of this study was to test the effectiveness of supplementing usual supportive care with aromatherapy massage in the management of anxiety and depression in cancer patients.

Methodology

In a pragmatic two-arm randomized controlled trial, 288 cancer patients, referred to complementary therapy services with clinical anxiety and/or depression, were allocated randomly to a course of aromatherapy massage or usual supportive care alone.

Results

Patients who received aromatherapy massage had no significant improvement in clinical anxiety and/or depression compared with those receiving usual care at 10 weeks post randomization (odds ratio, 1.3; p = 0.1), but did at 6 weeks post randomization (odds ratio, 1.4; p = 0.01). Patients receiving aromatherapy massage also described greater improvement in self-reported anxiety at both 6 and 10 weeks post randomization (odds ration, 3.4; p = 0.04 and odds ration, 3.4; p = 0.04), respectively.

Conclusion

Aromatherapy massage does not appear to confer benefit on cancer patients' anxiety and/or depression in the long-term, but is associated with clinically important benefit up to 2 weeks after the intervention.

References

Wilkinson SM et al. Effectiveness of aromatherapy massage in the management of anxiety and depression in patients with cancer: a multicenter randomized controlled trial. Journal of Clinical Oncology 25 (5): 532-539, Feb 10, 2007.