Aromaterapia com óleo de lavanda no tratamento da agitação na pessoa com demência

: estudo de intervenção

Abstract

Agitation is the most common symptom and widespread among residents with dementia, the main reason for care burden, stress, reduced quality of life for the individual, family and caregivers, and a factor that leads to institutionalization. Treatment for agitation behavior has been traditionally leading by institutional policies of control and containment, consisting on environmental, mechanical and chemical restraints combinations. However, these approaches are increasingly disproved both for ethical and evidence reasons, received non-pharmacological interventions increasingly more attention on care of these patients. Some evidence suggests that aromatherapy with lavender, may benefit reduction of agitation in patients with dementia, however, more research is needed to confirm their effectiveness. This quasi-experimental study examined the effectiveness of aromatherapy with lavender oil as a non-pharmacological intervention on reducing agitation in people with dementia living in a nursing home, in England. The intervention was administered through an electric diffuser during six weeks in the night time. Agitation was the primary outcome assessed using two scales, PAS (Pittsburgh Agitation Scale) and CMAI (Cohen Mansfield Agitation Inventory - Inventory Cohen Mansfield Agitation). As a secondary outcome were monitored participants individual features as: body weight, blood pressure, heart rate and the number hours of sleep. Completed the study proceeded to the analysis of the quantitative results. A reduction of agitation was observed in all participants, and the average number of hours of sleep and weight was increased. There were slight changes in blood pressure and heart rate. These results corroborate with previous studies demonstrating the important role of aromatherapy in the treatment of behavioral and psychological symptoms in people with dementia, particularly in agitation.

Date of Award	21 Nov 2014
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Luís Sá (Supervisor) & Sílvia Coelho (Supervisor)