Analgesic Effect of Music During Wound Care Among Patients With Diaphyseal Tibial Fractures: Randomized Controlled Trial

BACKGROUND: Evidence is scarce regarding the analgesic effect of music for the relief of acute pain during the care of surgical tibial fracture wounds. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the analgesic effect of music on acute procedural pain during the care of surgical tibial fracture wounds. METHOD: This was a randomized, controlled, blinded clinical trial with 70 patients in the immediate postoperative period for diaphyseal tibial fracture surgery. Participants were randomly allocated to two groups: a control group (CG), in which patients received only the institution\u27s standard analgesia, and an intervention group (IG) composed of patients receiving a 30-min session of music of their own choice, as a complementary method to the institution\u27s standard analgesia. Pain was evaluated during the first postoperative dressing change, using the Numerical Rating Scale (NRS). RESULTS: The sample was homogeneously composed of men (91.4%), young adults (61.4%), without previous diseases (88.6%) and whose traumas were related to a motorcycle crash (84.3%). The main musical genres chosen by participants were the most popular in their region (61.4%). Those who listened to music presented lower pain scores when compared with those in the CG (IG:2.4 ± 2.4 versus CG:5.8 ± 2.7; p \u3c 0.001; ?(2) = 0.171; p \u3c 0.001). CONCLUSION: Listening to music is effective for relieving acute procedural pain during the first post-operative tibial fracture dressing change. Music should be incorporated into the multimodal analgesia protocols for management of orthopedic postoperative wound care-related pain. SIGNIFICANCE: Patients with diaphyseal tibial fractures that listened to music before and during the wound dressing change showed less pain when compared to those who received the standardized pharmacologic analgesia alone