The Impact of Foot Reflexology on Nausea-Vomiting and Sleep Quality for Lung Cancer Patients Receiving Chemotherapy in Turkey

Abstract

* This study was accepted as doctoral thesis by the Health Sciences Institute of Karadeniz Technical University. ** This study was presented as an oral presentation in the 1 st International Congress of Internal Medicine Nursing, 25-27 November, 2018, Lara/Antalya, Turkey. BACKGROUND/AIMS: The aim of this study was to determine the impact of foot reflexology on nausea-vomiting and sleep quality in patients with lung cancer receiving chemotherapy in Turkey. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study was conducted with a pre-test/post-test experimental design. 60 patients (30 experimental group and 30 control group) receiving chemotherapy in an oncology center were included. Patients in the experimental and control groups were selected from the population using a random sampling method. Foot reflexology was given to the experimental group. After receiving the second course of chemotherapy, foot reflexology was applied for the first time to the patients in the experimental group, twice a week for four weeks; 8 sessions in total. The “Rhodes Nausea, Vomiting and Regurgitation Scale” and the “PSQI” were used in the questionnaire, which was administered to all patients twice, after receiving the second course of chemotherapy and 4 weeks later. Chi-square, Mann-Whitney U test, the Wilcoxon test and Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance were used. RESULTS: The sociodemographic characteristics of the patients were as follows: 53.3% of the patients in the experimental group were 61 years or older, 80% were male, 83.3% were married. 60% of the patients in the control group were 61 years or older, 86.7% were male, 83.3% were married. Most had been diagnosed less than 6 months previously (control group 63.4%, experimental group 60.0%). Most participants had first stage lung cancer (control group 80.0%, experimental group 70.0%). It was found that there was a significant difference between the control and experimental groups in terms of their nausea-vomiting and retching mean scores of “symptom experience” (p=0.0001), “symptom formation” (p=0.0001), “symptom distress” (p=0.0001), “subjective sleep quality” (p=0.0001), “sleep latency” (p=0.019), “daytime dysfunction” (p=0.002), “sleep disturbances” (p=0.002) and their means of the PSQI (p=0.002). CONCLUSION: Foot reflexology was found to be an effective method in reducing sleep problems together with the experience, formation and distress of nausea and vomiting for those patients with lung cancer who were receiving chemotherapy.