Studies suggest that Reflexology is Effective for Cancer, Dementia, Diabetes & Multiple Sclerosis!
June 11, 2011
Recently in a review-study researchers have reported that reflexolology can be effective in the treatment of multiple diseases, including: cancer patients, dementia, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, premenstrual syndrome & symptomatic idiopathic detrusor over-activity.
Reflexology became known as a very popular form of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). The aim of the review study was is to critically evaluate the evidence for or against the effectiveness of reflexology in patients with various types of medical condition.
The study included a search to identify all relevant randomised clinical trials (RCTs). The methodological quality was assessed independently by two reviewers using the so-called Jadad score. In total 23 studies met all inclusion criteria. These studies related to a wide range of medical conditions. Unfortunately, the researchers concluded that in many cases methodological quality of the RCTs was poor.
The result were: in total nine high quality RCTs generated negative findings & five generated positive findings. Eight RCTs suggested that reflexology is effective for the following conditions: diabetes, premenstrual syndrome, cancer patients, multiple sclerosis, symptomatic idiopathic detrusor over-activity and dementia yet important caveats remain.
The researchers concluded that the best clinical evidence does not demonstrate convincingly that reflexology can be considered as an effective treatment for any medical condition, because the size of the positive effects were not very large.
Unfortunately, the study did not make recommendations regarding the effectiveness of specified forms of reflexology, such as foot reflexology & hand reflexology.
