Effect of auricular acupressure for postpartum insomnia: an uncontrolled clinical trial

Abstract

Aims and objectives: This study examined the effects of auricular acupressure therapy on women with postpartum insomnia.

Background: Postpartum women generally have poor sleep quality because of frequent night-time breastfeeding during the first month after giving birth.

Design: A one-group pretest/post-test quasi-experiment was conducted.

Methods: A convenience sampling method was used to recruit participants at a postpartum centre (doing-the-month centre) in Northern Taiwan, from January 2014-July 2014. Thirty women with postpartum insomnia received auricular acupressure therapy on one auricular point (Shenmen point pressing) four times a day for 14 days. The Chinese version of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index was used to assess sleep quality before and after the 14-day treatment.

Results: After the 14-day auricular acupressure treatment, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index total scores of the women decreased from 8·7 (pretest) to 5·57 (post-test, 36% reduction). Scores on the subscales of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, including sleep quality, sleep latency, sleep duration and sleep disturbance, also statistically improved (p < 0·05).

Conclusions: Hormone changes and frequent breastfeeding were identified as characteristics that may exacerbate poor sleep quality of postpartum women, for whom the auricular acupressure intervention may effectively improve sleep quality.

Relevance to clinical practice: Auricular acupressure can be an alternative complementary therapy to aid postpartum women with insomnia in improving sleep quality.

Keywords: auricular point acupressure; postpartum; sleep quality.