Effectiveness of foot reflexology on pain perception during first stage of labour among primigravida mothers at Kovai Medical Centre and Hospital, Coimbatore.

The present study was conducted to assess the effectiveness of foot reflexology on pain perception among primigravida mothers during first stage of labour. The study was undertaken in the year 2011-2012 in partial fulfilment of requirement for the Master Degree of Science in Nursing at KMCH College of Nursing, Coimbatore which is affiliated to The Tamilnadu DR.MGR Medical University, Chennai. OBJECTIVES: The objectives are as follows: to assess the pain perception of primigravida mothers during the first stage of labour before & after providing foot reflexology on experimental & control group, to determine the effectiveness of foot reflexology on pain perception of the primigravida mothers within the experimental group & to associate the pain perception of the primigravida mothers with selected demographic variables. HYPOTHESIS: There is a significant reduction in pain perception during the first stage of labour among primigravida mothers who receive foot reflexology than those who do not receive. DESIGN: In Quasi-experimental pre-test post-test control group design. SETTING: labour room of KMCH, Coimbatore. SAMPLE: the sample size was 60, in which 30 were experimental and the remaining 30 were control group. SAMPLING TECHNIQUE: Non probability purposive sampling technique. CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK: Ernestine wiedenbach’s helping art of clinical nursing theory (1970). DATA COLLECTION: Numerical pain intensity scale was used to assess the pain perception of mothers during the active phase of labour. INTERVENTION: After 3cm of cervical dilatation, when the contraction starts, pre-test pain assessment was obtained. After that, foot reflexology was applied for the five succeeding contractions to the experimental group. Post-test pain score was obtained at the next contraction following intervention. RESULT: The mean score of pre-test pain perception (7.7) was higher than the post test score (6) in the experimental group. This shows that there is significant reduction in pain perception after foot reflexology. This is proved by t test 8.55(P