Effect of Vimala Massage on Physiological Jaundice in Infants: A RandomizedControlled Trial

Introduction: considering the prevalence of jaundice in newborn infants and therisk of developing acute bilirubin encephalopathy, in early weeks after birth. theimportance of infancy, as well as positive effects of giving massage on physical andbehavioral growth and evolution of infants, the current study has been aimed toinvestigate the effects of vimala massage on neonatal physiological jaundice. methods:this is a single blind clinical trial study, 43 healthy term infants, with 1st daybilirubin levels of less than 5mg/dl, carried out in tabriz al-zahra hospital.newborns were selected through convenience sampling and then randomly assigned tointervention and control groups. control group received routine care, while newborns of intervention group received four days of vimala massage starting from the first dayof their birth. main variables of study include transcutaneous bilirubin and frequencyof defecation. collected data were analyzed by spss ver.13 through chi-square andmann–whitney tests. results: there were no statistical significant differences betweentwo groups for skin bilirubin, however the number of defecations in the interventiongroup exceeded than of control group, and was statistically significant. conclusion:the results show that vimala massage within four days has no effect on increasingprocess of bilirubin, yet can affect the incidence rate of physiological jaundice andcare of infants by increasing defecation frequency.