IMPLEMENTATION OF DEEP BREATHING RELAXATION, MUSIC THERAPY, AND EFFLUERAGE MASSAGE THERAPY TO DECREASE PAIN SCALE OF DYSMENORHEA AMONG COLLEGE STUDENTS

Abstract

Many college students experience  dysmenorrhea (pain before or during menstruations)  every month. Pain avoids them come in to class regularly, reduce activities, affect concentration and perhaps academic performance. Based on a result of interviewing 20 college students, it was found that most of them did not know yet that deep breathing, music therapy or massage effective to decrease pain. Most of them are used to drink herbal or analgesic that they bought over the counter. Some of them stay on bed and apply Kajuput Oil over the abdomen. Purpose. To identify the pain scale of dysmenorrhea  before and after performing deep breathing relaxation, listening to an instrumental music, and receiving an effleurage massage therapy. Also to differentiate which among three interventions significantly decrease the pain scale. Method. This study was conducted by using experimental method with three group’s pre-test and post-test design. Its participants involved 45 students who were selected purposively and divided evenly in to three different intervention groups. Result. All of the interventions are significantly effective to decrease pain scale of dysmenorrhea. The most significant  is effleurage massage therapy followed by music therapy. It is found that deep breathing relaxation to be the less effective in this study.