Aromatherapy as the Intervention of Anxiety: Systematic Review

Background: Anxiety is a common problem that patients often experience in both the Hospital and the Community. Aromatherapy is used as an intervention to lower anxiety levels cause safely, easily, cheaply and without side effects. There are differences in method, type, dose, duration and technique of aromatherapy intervention so that require further study.Methods: The search of literature from various online databases obtained 10 RCT research journals to be analyzed according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria.Results: All of 10 articles significantly decreased anxiety. Inhalation method was used in 9 of 10 studies and 1 study used massage. The essential aromatherapy type of lavender oil or its combination is used in 8 articles (7 significantly decreased anxiety), 1 using bargamot and 1 using satureja. Duration of giving aromatherapy between 5-40 minutes at most 30 minutes (3 studies). A dose of aromatherapy 2 drops in 5 studies. Provision of intervention 1 times most used (5 studies), most intervention is 12 times (1 study). The longest intervention time is 4 weeks (2 studies).Conclusions: Generally recommend the use of lavender aromatherapy (lavandula angustifolia) intervention through inhalation method with a dose of 2 drops within 30 minutes to effectively decrease the anxiet