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Aromatherapy improves nausea, pain, and mood for patients receiving pediatric palliative care symptom-based consults: A pilot design trial

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 August 2019

Meaghann S. Weaver ,
Jacob Robinson  and
Christopher Wichman
Meaghann S. Weaver*
Affiliation:
Division of Pediatric Palliative Care, Department of Pediatrics, Children's Hospital and Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA
Jacob Robinson
Affiliation:
Division of Pediatric Palliative Care, Department of Pediatrics, Children's Hospital and Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA
Christopher Wichman
Affiliation:
Division of Biostatistics, Department of Public Health, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA
*
Corresponding Author: Meaghann Shaw Weaver, MD, MPH, FAAP Hand in Hand/Division of Palliative Care Children's Hospital and Medical Center Omaha 8200 Dodge Street Omaha, NE68114. E-mail: meweaver@childrensomaha.org
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Abstract

Objective

The role of aromatherapy in supportive symptom management for pediatric patients receiving palliative care has been underexplored. This pilot study aimed to measure the impact of aromatherapy using validated child-reported nausea, pain, and mood scales 5 minutes and 60 minutes after aromatherapy exposure.

Methods

The 3 intervention arms included use of a symptom-specific aromatherapy sachet scent involving deep breathing. The parallel default control arm (for those children with medical exclusion criteria to aromatherapy) included use of a visual imagery picture envelope and deep breathing. Symptom burden was sequentially assessed at 5 and 60 minutes using the Baxter Retching Faces scale for nausea, the Wong-Baker FACES scale for pain, and the Children's Anxiety and Pain Scale (CAPS) for anxious mood. Ninety children or adolescents (mean age 9.4 years) at a free-standing children's hospital in the United States were included in each arm (total n = 180).

Results

At 5 minutes, there was a mean improvement of 3/10 (standard deviation [SD] 2.21) on the nausea scale; 2.6/10 (SD 1.83) on the pain scale; and 1.6/5 (SD 0.93) on the mood scale for the aromatherapy cohort (p < 0.0001). Symptom burden remained improved at 60 minutes post-intervention (<0.0001). Visual imagery with deep breathing improved self-reports of symptoms but was not as consistently sustained at 60 minutes.

Significance of results

Aromatherapy represents an implementable supportive care intervention for pediatric patients receiving palliative care consults for symptom burden. The high number of children disqualified from the aromatherapy arm because of pulmonary or allergy indications warrants further attention to outcomes for additional breathing-based integrative modalities.

Keywords

Aromatherapypediatric palliativeintegrative therapycomplementary and alternative therapynauseapainmood
Type
Original Article
Information
Palliative & Supportive Care , Volume 18 , Issue 2 , April 2020 , pp. 158 - 163
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019

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