Effect of chamomile oil on stress, anxiety and quality of sleep among elderly in selected old age home at puducherry

Background: Ageing of population is increasing dramatically around the world. Ageing is a gradual process of growing old and it is a global phenomenon. Ageing of people is highly affected due to downward trends in mortality and fertility. Homes for the aged are ideal for elderly who are alone and they face many health problems and loneliness. Stress and anxiety because of functional dependency is common among elderly people and many would need assistance in their activities of daily living. In senior citizens stress can lead to relief activities such as excessive drinking, drug use, overeating which in turn leads to risk for heart problems. Anxiety is usually common in older adults, affecting 10-20% of the older population and it is often undiagnosed. For a number of reasons elderly people with anxiety disorders often go untreated. Due to stress and anxiety the elderly may not have a good quality of sleep. Therefore Chamomile oil aromatherapy is given to elderly at old age home to reduce the levels of stress and anxiety and improve the quality of sleep. Objectives • To assess the level of Stress, Anxiety and Quality of Sleep among Elderly in selected old age home • To evaluate the effectiveness of Chamomile oil Stress, Anxiety and Quality of Sleep among Elderly • To associate the level of Stress, Anxiety and Quality of Sleep with selected socio demographic variables Materials and methods: Quasi-experimental research design with one group pre-test and post-test was adopted and 60 elderly people with moderate stress and anxiety and poor quality of sleep were selected by purposive sampling technique. The data was collected using Cohen Perceived Stress Scale, Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index and analyzed in terms of both descriptive and inferential statistics. Result and discussion: The study result show that the pretest mean values of stress, anxiety and quality of sleep were 23.27, 18.95 and 10.35 and standard deviation were 2.69, 2.47 and 1.7 respectively. The post-test mean values of stress, anxiety and quality of sleep were 7.13, 8.22 and 5.55 and standard deviation were 4.99, 3.42 and 0.75 respectively. The obtained p value of stress, anxiety and quality of sleep is highly statistically significant at p<0.0001 indicating differences in pretest and post-test values. Conclusion: Thus this study concludes that Chamomile oil is effective in reducing the stress and anxiety and also improving the quality of sleep among elderly living in old age home.