RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Dry sauna treatments improve the quality of life for chronic pain, congestive heart failure, and type 2 diabetes patients. This study aimed to determine whether dry sauna therapy improved the quality of life of obese people. METHODS: A total of 38 consecutive participants aged over 20 years with a body mass index of ≥25 kg/m2 were recruited for the study. The participants were treated with a 90°C dry sauna for 15 minutes, twice daily for 4 consecutive days. To assess the quality of life, all participants completed the 5 level EQ-5D questionnaires and the EQ-Visual Analog Scale. Study parameters were measured on the same day prior to commencing the sauna sessions in a fasted state and 2 days after the last sauna session. RESULTS: The average age was 62.3±9.5 years; 84.2% of the participants were female. The mean body mass index was 28.5±2.4 kg/m2. Dry sauna significantly improved the mean 5 level EQ-5D index scores from 0.83±0.12 to 0.89±0.11 and increased the mean EQ-Visual Analog Scale from 79.0±15.2 to 91.1±9.7. However, there were no significant changes in body mass index, blood pressure, heart rate, or body composition before and after the 8-session sauna therapy. CONCLUSION: Dry sauna improved the health-related quality of life of obese patients without adverse events. Further clinical studies in larger study populations are needed to verify these findings and provide concrete evidence for obesity treatment.
RESUMO
PURPOSE: Inappropriate knowledge and attitude toward pain management of professionals has been pointed to be major obstacles to effective pain management in long-term care setting. The purpose of this study was to develop the knowledge and attitudes survey on pain management for Korean long-term care (LTC) professionals (KASP-K). METHODS: To develop the KASP-K, the knowledge and attitudes survey regarding pain developed by Ferrell and McCaffery in 2014 was amended after a review of broad literature and the latest pain management standards. A rigorous validation process of the KASP-K was performed by testing the content validity, item difficulty and discrimination index, construct validity, test-retest reliability, and internal consistency. RESULTS: The KASP-K consisted of 22 items and showed a content validity index of >0.7. The average difficulty of the KASP-K was 0.56 and the discrimination index was >0.2. The construct validity of the KASP-K was verified because of the differences in the sum scores depending on pain education (t = 2.30, p = .024). The test-retest reliability was r = .79 (p < .001) and the Cronbach's alpha was 0.73. CONCLUSION: This preliminary evaluation of the KASP-K demonstrated acceptable validity and reliability. The KASP-K will be able to provide scientific and empirical data regarding the knowledge of and attitude toward pain management by LTC professionals.
