Effect of acupressure (UB32) on pain intensity in intramuscular injections

Pain originating from intramuscular (IM) injection should not be underestimated, because it can damage the nurse-patient relationship. This research aimed at answering two main questions, whether acupressure is effective on pain severity due to IM injection or not and whether pain severity in two groups is different or not.

This research was performed in government-affiliated hospitals of Ilam. The patients were 15-55 years old. Subjects were individually asked to participate in the research, and an informed consent was obtained from them. Before injection, the patients were asked to lie in prone position and the acupressure point UB32 was found. It was pressed for 1 min circularly. Then, the acupressure point was pressed directly (pressure equal to 4.5 kg/cm(2)) by thumb three times sequentially. After acupressure, 3 ml penicillin 6.3.3 was injected to buttock muscle. In the control group was injected only penicillin 6.3.3 by the conventional method. Collected data were analyzed by SPSS 16 version.

Means of pain intensity in the acupressure group according to body mass index values (BMIs) were 1.50 ± 0.75 in thin, 1.64 ± 0.72 in normal, 1.38 ± 0.60 in overweight, 1.40 ± 0.54 in obese, and 1 ± 0.0 in severely obese subjects, with a total score of 1.53 ± 0.68. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed no significant difference between mean pain intensities based on BMI. There was no significant difference in the two groups concerning BMI and age (age: 30.24 ± 10.98 vs. 29.26 ± 10.07; BMI: 23.74 ± 4.45 vs. 23.88 ± 5.74), but the difference between them in terms of pain intensity mean was statistically significant.

It is concluded that acupressure in UB32 is effective on reducing the pain severity. Pain severity mean in the acupressure group was lesser than in the other group, and t-test showed a significant difference between the two groups.