- Chronic fatigue is a common long-lasting effect of breast cancer treatment
- Acupressure – stimulation of personal stress points on the physique – can easily alleviate symptoms by about a 3rd in simply 6 weeks, researchers say
Rosie Taylor for the Everyday Mail
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Cancer survivors could recommendations reduce symptoms of tiredness and weariness along with a easy do-it-on your own treatment, scientists have actually found.
Chronic fatigue is a common long-lasting effect of breast cancer treatment, along with about a 3rd of patients suffering moderate to significant levels for up to 10 years after the cancer is gone.
But a study has actually found that using acupressure – stimulation of personal stress points on the physique – can easily alleviate symptoms by about a 3rd in simply 6 weeks.
Results of the University of Michigan study found two thirds of women that had moderate to significant fatigue returned to typical tiredness levels by using a form of the treatment known as relaxing acupressure.
Using acupressure – stimulation of personal stress points on the physique – can easily alleviate symptoms of weariness in breast cancer survivors
Acupressure is derived from traditional Chinese medicine and includes applying stress along with fingers, thumbs or a device to personal points on the body.
Researchers tested two types of acupressure which stimulate various sections of the body: relaxing acupressure, which is traditionally used to address insomnia, and stimulating acupressure, which is used to improve energy.
They split a group of 288 breast cancer survivors randomly in to three groups, that either performed relaxing acupressure, stimulating acupressure or their usual care, which included sleep-management techniques.
The woman were provided 15 moments of training on exactly how to discover and stimulate the acupressure points so that they could perform it at house for 6 weeks.
They were told to stimulate each of 5 or 6 stress points for three moments once a day.
After 6 weeks of treatment the women were monitored for a further four weeks to see if the effects lasted.
At the end of the trial, the 2 acupressure treatments resulted in significant, sustained improvements in fatigue, along with about two in three women from the 2 teams returning to typical fatigue levels.
Only one in three of those that carried on as usual saw the exact same improvements.
While the 2 acupressure treatments performed well, only relaxing acupressure was found to likewise boost sleep quality and overall quality of life which continued after the treatment ended.
Around one in 10 participants dropped from the trial due to the fact that they felt the Everyday treatment was as well time-consuming and one women quit due to the fact that she said it was causing bruising.
Chronic fatigue is a common long-lasting effect of breast cancer treatment, along with about a 3rd of patients suffering moderate to significant levels for up to 10 years after the cancer is gone
Previous studies have actually suggested acupuncture could recommendations curb fatigue, Yet it is much less useful as patients need to go to a practitioner once or two times a week.
Study author Suzanna Zick said: ‘Fatigue is an underappreciated symptom across a great deal of chronic diseases, especially cancer. It has actually a substantial impact on quality of life.
‘Acupressure is simple to learn and patients can easily do it themselves. provided the brief training called for to learn acupressure, this intervention could be a low-cost option for treating fatigue.’
The researchers are now making a smartphone app to teach DIY acupressure.
Further studies will certainly consist of analysing why it functions and whether it can easily incentive patients undergoing cancer treatment or that suffer from various forms of cancer.
The research was published in the diary JAMA Oncology.
Samia al Qadhi, chief executive of Breast Cancer Care, said: ‘It’s excellent to see from this study exactly how complementary therapies, adore acupressure, could recommendations some women regulate fatigue as a consequence of their treatment.
‘Ongoing fatigue can easily have actually a huge impact on women’s lives, even years after treatment. It could mean they discover it difficult to return to work, or could demand recommendations along with housework or childcare.
‘However, acupressure won’t job for everyone suffering from fatigue, and women could wish to explore others selections which could recommendations them.’
Acupressure is derived from traditional Chinese medicine and includes applying stress along with fingers, thumbs or a device to personal points on the body