The Effect of a Foot Bath on Sleep Quality in The Elderly
Condition: Elderly; Sleep Quality; Complementary Therapy; Chronic Disease
MeSH terms: Chronic Disease
Study type: Interventional

Summary: 
      This study was carried out as a single-blind randomized controlled study to investigate the
      effect of a foot bath on sleep quality in the elderly.
    

Detailed description: 
      Sleep consists of psychological, physiological, and social dimensions and has an extremely
      significant function in meeting basic human needs. Sleep affects everyone's daily life and
      quality of life. One of the concepts that have been emphasized and gained importance recently
      is "sleep quality". Sleep quality is defined as "an individual's feeling ready and energetic
      for a new day after waking up". It is thought that sleep quality also has quantitative
      aspects such as falling asleep, sleep duration, number of awakenings at night, and subjective
      aspects such as restfulness or depth of sleep.

      The population of elderly individuals is increasing day by day worldwide. In the changing age
      pyramid, the rate of elderly population was 9.7 % (8245124 people) (over 65 years of age) in
      2021 and is estimated to be 11.0 % in 2025, 12.9 % in 2030, 16.3 % in 2040, 22.6 % in 2060,
      and 25.6% in 2080. With increasing age, changes occur in normal sleep patterns, complaints of
      insomnia increase, and satisfaction with sleep quality decreases. According to a literature
      review, sleep problems rank third among the reasons for visiting a doctor in the elderly,
      after digestive system problems and headache symptoms. The inability to fall asleep, waking
      up early in the morning, waking up frequently at night, and sleeping during the day are among
      the most common sleep-related problems in the elderly.

      Sleep problems in the elderly can cause serious problems but are also preventable. In this
      sense, all health personnel, especially nurses, should apply comprehensive nursing care to
      minimize sleep problems and improve sleep quality in the elderly. Pharmacological treatment
      is generally employed in the elimination of sleep problems. However, pharmacological
      treatment is inadequate in eliminating sleep problems, so the elderly continuously use
      medication, which can cause side effects. On the other hand, the tendency toward
      non-pharmacological treatment has recently increased, and developments have been achieved in
      non-pharmacological treatment methods. It has been reported that methods such as music
      therapy, eye mask, complementary therapies, massage, aromatherapy, and a foot bath are used
      to improve the sleep quality of elderly people with sleep problems. Foot baths are reported
      to facilitate falling asleep by affecting body temperature. Sleep quality may improve in
      patients whose falling asleep process becomes easier. However, to the best of this knowledge,
      no study has been found in Turkey in which foot baths are used in the elderly and other
      populations. After all these considerations, the effect of a foot bath on sleep quality in
      the elderly was analyzed in this study.
    

Intervention name(s): Foot Bath Group
Intervention type(s): Other
Intervention description(s): The elderly were asked to soak their feet in the water in a marked plastic container with a depth of 10 centimeters and a temperature of 41-42°C for 20 minutes up to their ankles 50 minutes before normal sleeping hours every night for 8 weeks.
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention model: Parallel Assignment
Intervention model description: The sample size was calculated as 36 (18 for each group) elderly in total for the two groups (foot bath group, control group) with an effect size of 1,000 and the power of the targeted test was 0.90 (90%) in the G*Power 3.1.9.6 program with the error of α=0.05 and a reference to a previous study on the subject (14). Considering the cases such as withdrawal from the study or death during the research, each group was increased and a total of 50 elderly individuals, 25 elderly people for each group, were recruited for the study
Masking: None (Open Label)
Primary purpose: Supportive Care
Keywords: Elderly; Sleep quality; Foot bath; Complementary therapy; Chronic disease