Effect of Acupressure on Non- stress Test (NST) Results: A Randomized-Controlled Trial Study

Abstract

Introduction Pregnancy and delivery are among the most stressful events in women's lives. Breech presentation occurs in 3-4 of all deliveries. Some conventional non-surgical therapies for breech presentation are available. Moxibustion, acupuncture and other acupoint (BL67) stimulations are commonly used for the correction of breech presentation. The present study aimed to evaluate the effect of acupressure on NST results. Materials and Methods This is a clinical trial study that was conducted in one group and two-steps. 32 Pregnant women (3236 weeks) in age range 18 to 35 year-old, who were referred to Shahid Beheshti Hospital in IsfahanIran, in 2013 to receive routine prenatal care, were randomly selected. They were stimulated immediately after the first Non-stress test (NST) and before the second test. The researcher evaluated and analyzed variables using SPSS software version 20. Results The mean age of the subjects was 24.7 +/- 2.8 and 93.8 of them were housewives. The frequency of reactive non stress test was same before and after stimulation. The mean time of the tests' result significantly decreased after stimulation (P-value <0.05). Conclusion Although fetal non-stress test result was not influenced by acupressure, this intervention led to shorter testing time to achieve results. In other words, after the intervention, the time it takes to reach a reactive fetal non-stress test was about 2.7 minutes less than the time without intervention.