Comparing the Effect of Breast-Milk and Leg Massage on Neonate’s Pain ‎Intensity during Heel-Blood Sampling in Neonatal Care Unit

Prevention and management of pain is one of the major challenges in the neonate intensive care units. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of breast-milk and leg massage on the intensity pain from painful procedures such as heel stick.

This study was a randomized clinical trial aimed to compare the effect of breast-milk and leg massage on neonate’s pain intensity during heel-blood sampling in neonatal care unit of Tehran Fayazbakhsh Hospital, Iran in 2016. Neonates were divided into two groups of 15, based on randomly number schedule. In the first group, first massage, then heel stick was performed, after 12 hours of wash out period, breast feeding intervention was performed and then blood sampling was done from the other heel. In the second group, the intervention group, the action had done opposite. The neonates were laid in the supine or lateral position, at the same time as bleeding was started, filming of the faces and organs of the infant was carried out by a researcher's colleague and it continued only two minutes after the bleeding was completed.Videos were viewed by two senior specialist babies and the pain intensity was determined based on the NIPS scale. The data were fed into the SPSS 20 software and descriptive and analytic statistics were applied for data analysis.

The mean of the statistical Wilcoxon signed Ranks Test showed that there was a significant difference for pain score during (p<0/001), and after the intervention of each of the two groups (p<0/0001).

Based on the result of study, nurses can use leg massage to decrease the pain during painful procedures relevant to newborns instead of breast-milk.