STIMULUS EFFECT CUTANEOUS (SLOW-STROKE BACK MASSAGE) TO INTENSITY OF PAIN HEAD IN ELDERLY WITH HYPERTENSION

Abstract

Hypertension is systolic blood pressure greater than or equal to 140 mmHg and diastolic blood pressure greater than or equal to 90 mmHg One of the risk factors that lead to this unstability is aging process so that the primary clinical symptoms of headache. One of the non-pharmacological ways to cope with this pain is by applying cutaneus stimulation with slow-stroke back massage method. The mechanism of cutaneous stimulation using the principle of gate control theory and the theory of endorphins. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of cutaneous stimulus (Slow-Stroke Back Massage) to the intensity of headache in the elderly with hypertension. The design used is to one group pretest-posttest. The research began February 23^th until March 7^th, 2015. The sample of this study were elderly people aged 55 to 80 years using purposive sampling technique were 30 elderly. The data collected by observation. The results of the 30 respondents before given stimulus cutaneous mostly experienced moderate pain is there are 21 (70%) of respondents, and after given stimulus cutaneus a small portion experienced mild pain is there are 7 (23.3%) of respondents. According of Wilcoxon Signed Rank test that p value (0.000) <α (0.05), then H₀ is rejected and H₁ accepted that there is effect of cutaneous stimulus (Slow-Stroke Back Massage) to the intensity of headache in the elderly with hypertension.This research showed that administration of cutaneous stimulusis very effective in order to reduce the intensity of headache. Then of the cutaneous stimulus (slow-stroke back massage) can be used as an alternative option toreduce the intensity ofheadachein patients with hypertension.