Abstract
BACKGROUND: Nausea and vomiting are one of the common and distressing side effects of chemotherapy in breast cancer patients often impacting their quality of life and treatment adherence. The purpose of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to determine whether acupressure is effective in treating breast cancer patients' acute nausea and vomiting brought on by chemotherapy as well as delayed nausea and vomiting. METHODS: We systematically searched for Randomized controlled trials and quasi-experimental studies in PubMed, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Clinical Key, Web of Science, EMBASE, and Scopus. Based on the inclusion criteria two reviewers independently identified the articles using key thesaurus and free text terms. The review was guided by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) Statement. RESULTS: According to the pooled findings, acupressure combined with antiemetics greatly lessens the severity of acute nausea [SMD, (95% CI)] [-0.35(-0.62,-0.08), P=0.01, I2=0%], delayed nausea [SMD, (95% CI)] [-0.52(-0.78,-0.26), P<0.001, I2=16%], and delayed vomiting [SMD, (95% CI)] [-0.46(- 0.83,-0.08), P=0.02, I2=43%] brought on by chemotherapy. CONCLUSION: For chemotherapy-treated breast cancer patients, acupressure is a helpful complementary therapy for easing nausea and vomiting.