The effect of Gentle Human Touch on behavioral states in preterm infants

Due to rapid advance in medical technologies and nursing care survival rate of preterm infants has significantly increased. Compensation sensory stimulation that infant receive during intrauterine period can promote preterm infants maturation. This study was conducted to determination effect of gentle human touch on behavioral states in preterm infants. This interventional study was performed on 60 preterm infants (with 26-34 gestational age) that hospitalized in Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) of Afzalipour hospital Kerman, Iran. Samples were randomly selected and divided into two groups (intervention and control groups). Neonates in Interventional group receive Gentle Human Touch for 15 min twice a day for 5 days. By using the Anderson Behavior State Scale (ABSS) was measured infants behavioral states in before and after of intervention. In this study, mean scores of ABSS in preterm infants of the intervention and control groups was
4.85±0.14 and 10.63±0.14, respectively.There was a significant difference between the scores of ABSS between two after the intervention (P-Value<0/001). The finding suggest that GHT could be raised effective method for increase sleep state and decrease fussy state to reduce effects of stressors in NICU.