Effectiveness of Massage Therapy in the Management of Depression and Quality of Life

Mood disorders like depression can affect people at any time in their lives. Mental cold is a common term to describe this disorder because of its high prevalence rate. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of six weeks of massage therapy on quality of life and depression in subjects diagnosed with depression in subjects diagnosed with depression. Twenty female diagnosed by depression(the Beck Depression Inventory scores above 18) were recruited in this study. Then they equally classified in two groups of control(N=10, Mean±SD age; 27.2±5.3 years) and experiment(N=10, Mean±SD age; 31.2±7.61 years). Experimental group received message therapy three times a week for 6-week. The control group received no treatment. Beck Depression Questionnaire and Wisconsin Quality of Life Client Questionnaire were used to measure depression and quality of life score, respectively. SPSS software, version 21, was used to analyze data, the significant level set at 0/05. The results showed that the depression score and quality of life in post-test massage therapy group was significantly less than the pre-test. The selected intervention reduced the level of depression and increased the quality of life scores(p<0/05). It seems that massage therapy can be an effective treatment for reducing depression and raising the quality of life. Therefore, the findings may support the positive impact of massage therapy in depressed subjects.