The Comparison of Sucking Ice Bits With Plain Water and Ice Bits Containing of Mint Extract on Nausea and Vomiting During Chemotherapy in Patients Suffering from Breast Cancer

Background and purpose: Breast cancer is known as the most widely recognized and lethal disease among women. Various strategies including surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy are applied to cure cancer. Chemotherapy, as a typical helpful strategy, brings about various physical and mental symptoms. Nausea and vomiting are amongst the most common widely recognized symptoms of chemotherapy. Regardless of advancement in anti-nausea and anti-vomiting medicines, nausea and vomiting are yet the most widely recognized reactions of chemotherapy. In one hand, alternative and complementary medicines are among basic and safety measurements. This study has been accomplished to compare the effect of sucking ice bits with plain water and ice bits containing of mint concentrate on nausea and vomiting during chemotherapy. Materials and methodology: In this clinical study, 90 patients suffering from breast cancer with chemotherapy were placed into three groups of "control", "ice bits with plain water", and "ice containing of mint extract" randomly. Thirty ice bits in 1cc, 30 ice bits with mint extract in 1cc, and 30 cc of water were given to "ice bits with plain water", "ice bits containing mint extract", and "control" groups; respectively. Nausea was assessed by numerical scale of VAS, and vomiting was evaluated based on frequency. SPSS16 software was applied to analyze data. Findings: The findings showed that intervention group of "ice bits with plain water", "ice bits containing of mint extract", and "control" groups have got averages of 1.6, 1.96, and 2.9; respectively indicating to significance (P-value: 0.010), while in "ice bits with plain water" and in intervention group of "ice containing of mint extract" group there are 0.2, 0.233 vomiting cases, so that an average of 0.266 vomiting was observed in the control group indicating to a lack of significance (P-value: 0.835). Conclusion: According to the study results, sucking ice bits with plain water and ice bits containing of mint extract can take effect on nausea while they make no effect on vomiting resulted from chemotherapy.