Music intervention should be offered as an adjunct alternative to pharmacological pain relief after abdominal surgery in nursing practice.

Contradictory results have been presented on how music listening affects patients' blood pressure, heart rate, and respiratory rate. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effects of music listening on blood pressure, heart rate, and respiratory rate on operation day, and on the first, second, and third postoperative days in abdominal surgery patients. Using a quasi-experimental pretest-post-test design, 168 abdominal surgery patients were assigned every second week to the music group (n=83) or to the control group (n=85) for 25 months. In the music group, the respiratory rate was significantly lower after intervention on both the first and second postoperative days compared with the control group. A significant reduction in systolic blood pressure was demonstrated in the group that received music compared with the control group on both the first and second postoperative days. Evaluation of the long-term effects of music on physiological factors showed that the respiratory rate in the music group was significantly lower compared with the control group. Nurses should offer music listening to surgery patients because of its potential benefit.

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Postoperative pain management is based on the use of analgesics; however, music may alleviate pain either by direct analgesic effects or by relaxing and distracting the mind from pain and unpleasant feelings. Conflicting results have been presented about how listening to music affects analgesic use and length of hospital stay after surgery. We assessed the effect of music listening on analgesic use, length of hospital stay, and adverse effects in adult patients having laparotomy, using a prospective design with two parallel groups. Patients undergoing elective abdominal surgery (n ϭ 168) were assigned to either a music group (n ϭ 83) operated on odd weeks or a control group (n ϭ 85) operated on even weeks. The music group listened to music 7 times for 30 minutes at a time during the first 3 postoperative days. The control group did not listen to the music. The hypotheses that patients in the music group will need less analgesic, have a shorter length of hospital stay, and experience less adverse effects than those in the control group were not supported by the data, although patients recovering from surgery enjoyed listening to music. Music listening may enhance quality of hospital stay and recovery in patients undergoing major abdom inal surgery and could be a useful tool to relieve the patient's pain experience.Gastroenterology Nursing

Evidence-based nursing requires carefully designed interventions. This paper discusses methodological issues and explores practical solutions in the use of music intervention in pain management among adults after major abdominal surgery. There is a need to study nursing interventions that develop and test the effects of interventions to advanced clinical nursing knowledge and practice. There are challenges in carrying out intervention studies in clinical settings because of several interacting components and the length and complexity of the causal chains linking intervention with outcome. Intervention study is time-consuming and requires both researchers and participants' commitment to the study. Interdisciplinary and multiprofessional collaboration is also paramount. In this study, patients were allocated into the music group, in which patients listened to music 30 minutes at a time, or the control group, in which patients did not listen to any music during the same period.