Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback Intervention for Reduction of Psychological Stress During the Early Postpartum Period

The Author(s) 2014. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract This study examined the effectiveness of heart rate variability (HRV) biofeedback intervention for reduction of psychological stress in women in the early postpartum period. On postpartum day 4, 55 healthy sub-jects received a brief explanation about HRV biofeedback using a portable device. Among them, 25 mothers who agreed to implement HRV biofeedback at home were grouped as the biofeedback group, and other 30 mothers were grouped as the control group. At 1 month postpartum, there was a significant decrease in total Edinburgh Post-natal Depression Scale score (P \ 0.001) in the biofeed-back group; this change was brought about mainly by decreases in items related to anxiety or difficulty sleeping. There was also a significant increase in standard deviation of the normal heartbeat interval (P \ 0.01) of the resting HRV measures in the biofeedback group after adjusting for potential covariates. In conclusion, postpartum women who implemented HRV biofeedback after delivery were rela-tively free from anxiety and complained less of difficulties sleeping at 1 month postpartum. Although the positive effects of HRV biofeedback may be partly attributable to intervention effects, due to its clinical outcome, HRV biofeedback appears to be recommendable for many post-partum women as a feasible health-promoting measure after childbirth