Review of Clinical Trials on Aromatherapy in PubMed

PubMed 검색을 통해 살펴본 Aromatherapy의 임상연구동향에 관한 고찰

Aromatherapy is becoming increasingly popular, however there are few clear indications for its use. To systematically review the clinical studies on aromatherapy, computcrized literature searches were performed from PubMed. Fourteen trials were located. The conclusions were as follows: 1. All the trials were published after 1993. 2. To analyze the publication journals, five of fourteen trials were on nursing, three of them on neuropsychiatry and one on dermatology. 3. Most widely used indications of aromatherapy were on general physical, psychological and physiological field. 4. On the procedure of aromatherapy, eight of them were by massage, three by inhalation, one by massage & inhalation and one by bath additive. 5. To analyze the publication type, all fourteen trials were clinical trials. Twelve of them were randomized controlled trials. Two of them were using single subject design. 6. To observe the sample size, five of them were under 10, four from 10 to 50, two from 50 to 100 and three above 100. 7. Eleven of fourteen trials were using inferential statistics. Eight of the eleven trials were significantly effective, but three had no statistical significance.