Association of Complementary and Alternative Therapies With Mental Health Outcomes in Pregnant Women Living in a Postdisaster Recovery Environment.
Veronica Barcelona de Mendoza, Emily Harville, Jane Savage and 1 others
PMID 26503992WHAT IT FOUND
Pregnant women using massage had lower odds of depressive symptoms, while those using aromatherapy or journaling had higher odds.
These are associations from a survey, not proof that these therapies help or harm mental health.
Key findings
01Women who used massage were less likely to have likely depression before adjustment, but this association was no longer significant after adjusting for education, age, parity, income and race.
02When the threshold for depression was lowered, massage was protective, while use of aromatherapy and keeping a journal were associated with increased odds of depressive symptoms.
03Women who reported using aromatherapy in pregnancy were more than twice as likely to have symptoms of pregnancy-related anxiety.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The study is cross-sectional, so it cannot determine if CAM use caused changes in mental health symptoms or if women with certain symptoms were more likely to use specific therapies. Participants were recruited from prenatal care settings, which may exclude women with the most severe mental health issues who did not seek care. The study used screening tools rather than diagnostic interviews, so it identifies symptoms rather than confirmed mental illness. Multiple comparisons were made without statistical correction, increasing the risk of false positive findings. The sample was limited to women living in a post-disaster recovery environment, which may not generalize to other populations.
The easy way to misread this
Do not interpret the association between aromatherapy and higher anxiety as evidence that aromatherapy causes anxiety. Women with higher symptom burden may have chosen aromatherapy as a coping mechanism, and the cross-sectional design cannot distinguish cause from effect.