Effectiveness of Mixed Massage Program in Patients with Neck And Shoulder Pain of Thai Traditional Medicine and Alternative Medicine Department, Prasrimahabhodi Psychiatric Hospital, Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand

Abstract

This quasi-experimental research aimed to assess the effectiveness of mixed massage program in patients with neck and shoulder pain by comparing the differences of the mean scores of neck and shoulder pain, relaxation and satisfaction of the experimental group and the control group. The samples were 44 service recipients at Thai Traditional Medicine and Alternative Medicine Department, Prasrimahabhodi Psychiatric Hospital, Ubon Ratchathani who had neck and shoulder pain. Purposive sampling method was used to select the samples by matching. The samples were separated into two groups. There were 22 people in the experimental group receiving the mixed massage program while 22 people in the control group received the Royal Thai massage. Both groups received three sessions of massage therapy, one to two days apart each time. Pain assessment form, relaxation assessment form and satisfaction assessment form were used to evaluate the results. The differences between the experimental group and the control group were tested by Mann-Whitney U test. The results showed that the experimental group had lower mean score of neck and shoulder pain than the control group with statistical significance (U=-2.38, p<0.05). The mean scores of the relaxation of the experimental were higher than those of the control group (U=76.50, p<0.05) and also the mean scores of the satisfaction of the experimental were higher than those of the control group (U = 66.00, p<0.05).