| Nausea is widely recognized as one of the most frequent and troublesome side effects of cancer chemotherapy and remains widely prevalent despite the advances in antiemetic medications brought about by the introduction of the 5-HT3 receptor antagonist class of antiemetics (ondansetron, granisetron, tropisitron). One heretofore largely unexplored but potentially useful adjunct to pharmacological control of nausea may be acustimulation (i.e., electrical stimulation to an acupuncture point). This experiment tested the efficacy of acustimulation to a traditional Chinese acupuncture point, located on the inside of the wrist, that is associated with nausea relief. In addition, patients' expectation for nausea occurrence, which is hypothesized to influence its subsequent development, was examined both as a potential mediating variable for this intervention and as a variable of interest in its own right.;This was a randomized clinical trial using a three-level crossover design (active acustimulation, incorrect location acustimulation and no acustimulation), examining the efficacy of an acustimulation wrist band for the relief of chemotherapy-induced nausea. Patients who experienced moderate or greater nausea at their first chemotherapy treatment were recruited prior to their second treatment. All patients at all trials also received standard antiemetic medications as prescribed by their physicians. Nausea expectations were assessed prior to each treatment and nausea occurrence following each treatment. Twenty-five patients provided evaluable data from all three treatments and an additional 13 provided partial data. Analyses were conducted both on the full data set as well as on a subset of data from 16 patients who completed all treatments without a change in medications.;The hypothesis that acustimulation, as an adjunct to standard antiemetics, would reduce nausea associated with chemotherapy was not affirmed. However, in the subset analyses, significantly less antiemetic medication was used in the active acustimulation condition of the experiment compared to the no acustimulation condition, suggesting that there may be some benefit derived from using the acustimulation device. This experiment provides ample justification for further study of acustimulation. These data also support previous findings from research groups reporting a relationship between patient expectations of nausea from chemotherapy and its subsequent development. Implications of these findings are discussed. |
