Learning Objective #1: Explain the breathing relaxation therapy to reduce pain for clients after cardiac surgery

Learning Objective #2: Describe the outcomes measurement of pain for clients after cardiac surgery

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Background: Pain is the most common problem for cardiac surgical patients. The physiological-theoretical basis of the breathing relaxation therapy was cognitively inducing respiratory sinus arrhythmia. Thus increasing heart rate variability. With the development of non-pharmaceutical pain control, the effect of breathing relaxation therapy in pain control was increased of respiratory-driven parasympathetic activity and heart rate variability. Objective: The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of breathing relaxation therapy in reducing pain and increasing heart rate variability in cardiac surgical patients. Method: The study utilized an experimental design. The experimentation collected 60 cardiac surgical patients from the cardiac surgical ward of a medical center.There were 30 patients were randomly assigned into experimental and control group, respectively. The control group received ward routine without intervention of breathing relaxation therapy. Before the operation, the patients in experimental group had trained and practiced of breathing relaxation therapy. After the patients were transferred from ICU to ordinary ward, the breathing relaxation therapy was done twice a day until 7th post-operative day. The effects of breathing relaxation therapy in reducing pain in cardiac surgical patients were evaluated in this study by the following parameters: level of pain, heart rate variability index. (Including SDNN, VLF, LF, HF, Total Power and LF/HF Ratio). Visual Analogue Scale measured the level of pain. Biocom Heart Rhythm Scanner, Version 2.0 was used to measure patients' heart rate variability index. Results: The expect results of this study that breathing relaxation therapy could reduce pain and increase heart rate variability. Conclusion: Breathing relaxation therapy is really a simple and effective non-pharmaceutical pain control treatment, and it is worth to widely applied in the clinical practice.