ABSTRACT
Purpose@#The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of hand press pellet on hand acupuncture point in elderly women with knee osteoarthritis. @*Methods@#This study used a nonequivalent control group pretest-posttest design. The hand press pellet therapy was conducted 3 times a week for 6 weeks. Sixty-five participants were randomly allocated to an experimental group (n=33) and a control group (n=32). The Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Arthritis (WOMAC) Index and Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) were used as measurement instruments. Data were analyzed with x2 test (Fisher's exact test), Shapiro-Wilk test, Mann-Whitney test, and Wilcoxon signed ranks test using the SPSS/WIN 25.0 program. @*Results@#The hand press pellet therapy group had significant improvements in the knee joint pain (z=-4.32, p<.001), knee joint stiffness (z=-4.02, p<.001), difficulty of activity daily life (z=-4.74, p<.001), and depression score (z=-2.12, p=.034) compared with the control group. @*Conclusion@#The hand press pellet therapy has been shown to be effective in knee joint pain, knee joint stiffness, difficulty of activity daily life and depression.