The Effect of Aromatherapy by Inhalation and Massage on Radiotherapy-Induced Fatigue in Patients with Cancer

Background: Fatigue is one of the most prevalent and debilitating complications of cancer and its treatments. Patients with radiotherapy experience some degrees of fatigue. Complementary medicine methods, have reduced the complications of treatments in many disorders. Accordingly, the present study was conducted with the aim of comparing the effect of aromatherapy by inhalation and massage on Radiotherapy-Induced fatigue in patients with cancer. Methods: In this Randomized Clinical Trial, 105 patients with cancer went through radiotherapy in Oncology ward of Firouzgar Hospital in Tehran- Iran. The subjects were selected conveniently based on the inclusion criteria and were randomly assigned into 3 groups of inhalation aromatherapy, massage aromatherapy and control groups. In the first group, Viola and almond oil were inhaled. In the second group, Swedish massage was performed using aromatic oil, and the control group received routine care. Fatigue   was measured by Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory (MFI) before, and at the end of the intervention. The data were analyzed by descriptive and inferential statistics (ANOVA, Paired T-tests, Fischer’s exact, and Chi-square tests) using SPSS software v.16.  Significance level was considered as P ≤0.05. Results: The findings showed that the three studied groups had no significant statistical difference in terms of demographic characteristics before the intervention. Fatigue score was significantly different in all three groups after both interventions (P-value <0/001), which indicated a fatigue decrease in two test groups. However, according to Scheffe post hoc test, massage aromatherapy was more effective in reducing fatigue resulting from radiotherapy. Conclusion: The results of this study showed that the massage aromatherapy has been more effective in reducing the radiotherapy-induced fatigue in patients with cancer. It is recommended that future studies add an only massage group to rule out the effect of massage itself.