Effects of Chamomile Essence on Episiotomy Healing in Primiparous Women

One of the major concerns for parturient women and midwives is the healing of episiotomy and prevention of its subsequent complications. In order to achieve perineal healing in the past, cold and warmth therapy, traditional medicine and povidone iodine were used. But today episiotomy care includes ice pack and warm. One of non pharmacologic methods is aromatherapy and one of aromatherapy products is chamomile essence used in midwifery care and can extensively be applied to perineal healing and prevention of episiotomy infection. This clinical trial was conducted to assess the effects of chamomile essence on episiotomy healing on primiparous women referring to Talesh Hospital of Shaheed Norani in 2007. In this double blind clinical trial, 44 women on intervention group of chamomile essence and 44 women on control group of placebo used sitz bath together with routine care twice a day, for two weeks. Then episiotomy healing process was assessed on the first 12 hours, 7th and 14thdays of postpartum. Healing process was considered as basic information on the first 12 hours. Findings showed that Mean pain on the 7th & 14th day decreased in the intervention group but it did not indicate a significant difference. Mean score (±standard deviation) perineal healing on the 7th day was on intervention group 1.61±1.08 and placebo group 1.34 ±0.9.Perineal healing mean on 14th day in intervention group 0.58 ±0.54 and placebo group 0.57±0.36. Mann Whitney, statistic tests showed no significant difference between these two groups. Results revealed that episiotomy healing was the same for both groups. It seems that more studies on this field with various doses and types of chamomile medical plant are necessary.