Advance Access Publication 4 July 2007 Original Article eCAM 2009;6(1)123–128 doi:10.1093/ecam/nem073 Anxiolytic Effect of Aromatherapy Massage in Patients with Breast Cancer Jiro Imanishi1, Hiroko Kuriyama1, Ichiro Shigemori1, Satoko Watanabe 1 , Yuka Aihara2, Masakazu Kita1, Kiyoshi Sawai3, Hiroo Nakajima 3 , Noriko Yoshida 4 , Masahiro Kunisawa 4 , Masanori Kawase5 and Kenji Fukui4 1Department of Microbiology, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Kawaramachi-Hirokoji, Kamikyo-ku, Kyoto 602-8566, 2Department of Psychosomatic Internal Medicine, Kansai Medical University, 10-15 Fumizono-cho, Moriguchi, Osaka 570-8506, 3Department of Endocrine and Breast Surgery, 4Department of Psychiatry, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Kawaramachi-Hirokoji, Kamikyo-ku, Kyoto 602-8566 and 5Department of Psychology, Kyoto Notre Dame University, 1 Minami-Nonogamicho, Shimogamo, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto 606-0847, Japan We examined how aromatherapy massage influenced psychologic and immunologic parameters in 12 breast cancer patients in an open semi-comparative trial. We compared the results 1 month before aromatherapy massage as a waiting control period with those during aromatherapy massage treatment and 1 month after the completion of aromatherapy sessions. The patients received a 30 min aromatherapy massage twice a week for 4 weeks (eight times in total). The results showed that anxiety was reduced in one 30 min aromatherapy massage in State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) test and also reduced in eight sequential aromatherapy massage sessions in the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) test. Our results further suggested that aromatherapy massage ameliorated the immunologic state. Further investigations are required to confirm the anxiolytic effect of aromatherapy in breast cancer patients. Keywords: anxiety – aromatherapy massage – breast cancer Introduction Aromatherapy is one of the complementary and alter- native medicines used to treat various diseases and symptoms, because essential oils have many kinds of pharmacologic actions including anti-microbial, sedative, analgesic, spasmolytic and estrogen or steroid hormone- like effects, etc. Since various kinds of essential oils such as true lavender, rose, mandarin, sweet orange, sandalwood, geranium, etc have anxiolytic activity, aromatherapy has been used for the relief of depression For reprints and all correspondence: Jiro Imanishi, MD, PhD, Department of Microbiology, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Kawaramachi-Hirokoji, Kamikyo-ku, Kyoto 602-8566, Japan. Tel: þ81-75-251-5330; Fax: þ81-75-251-5331; E-mail: imanishi-micro@nifty.com and anxiety. We have clarified that aromatherapy massage reduced anxiety and depression in healthy subjects and that it increased CD8-positive and CD16- positive lymphocytes in peripheral blood (1). Furthermore, we found that aromatherapy massage improved mild depression (2). Patients with cancer tend to be very anxious about the recurrence of cancer, even after complete remission. This anxiety in turn might reduce immunologic activity, resulting in an increase in the probability of recurrence. Several studies have centered on this anxiety in cancer patients. Fellowes et al. (3) concluded in a systematic review that aromatherapy massage conferred short-term benefits on psychologic well being, with the effect on anxiety supported by limited evidence and that effect 2007 The Author(s). This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.