The Effects of Self-care Program with Thai Massage and Combined herbal on Severity of Knee Osteoarthritis among Older Adults in a Community

Abstract

Purpose: To study the effects of self-care program with Thai massage and combined herbal on the severity of knee osteoarthritis among older adults in a community

Design: Quasi-experimental research
Methods: The Samples consisted of 60 socially older adults aged 60-80 years who received treatment at a Tambon Health Promoting Hospital. Muang District, Phisanulok Province. There were assigned to experimental and control groups by random assignment and matched pair gender, age, the severity of
osteoarthritis, and treatment osteoarthritis. Older adults in the experiment group received a program for self-care with Thai massage and combined herbal, while those in the control group received usual nursing care. The research instruments were 1) a self-care program with Thai massage and combined herbal
2) a knee osteoarthritis screening form 3) a knee osteoarthritis severity assessment scale. Its content validity was established by 3 experts and the content validity index (CVI) was 0.90, 0.95 and 0.87. Its interrater reliability coefficient was 0.87 and 0.85. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics and the independent t-test
Results: 1) The mean post-test score for severity of osteoarthritis of the participants in the experimental after receiving the program was significantly significant lower than the mean pretest score (p < .05).
2) The mean post-test score for severity of osteoarthritis of the participants in the experimental group was statistically significantly lower than that of the control group (p < .05).
Conclusion: The program with Thai massage and combined herbal among severity levels of knee osteoarthritis in the older adult in the community. It should be applied in caring for older adults with knee osteoarthritis to reduce expenses for self-care communities. In the future should expand the area of study and various health partners should be added for diverse perspectives.