Effect of nurse-led home-based biofeedback intervention on the blood pressure levels among patients with hypertension: Pretest–posttest study

AIM: To investigate the effect of nurse-led home-based biofeedback intervention on the blood pressure levels among patients with hypertension. BACKGROUND: Nurse-led interventions are emerging as cost-effective as well as clinically proven in chronic illness management. Hypertension, a leading long-term cardiovascular condition, has autonomic dysregulation and increased sympathetic tone as its pathophysiological background. Complementary interventions evidenced to interplay hypertension pathophysiology. DESIGN: A pretest–posttest design. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Uncomplicated primary hypertension outpatients were randomly assigned as study group (n = 173) and control group (n = 173) at a tertiary care hospital. Sociodemographic, clinical, and outcome variables [the baseline blood pressure and galvanic skin response (GSR)] were collected. Study group patients were given four teaching sessions of abdominal breathing-assisted relaxation facilitated by GSR biofeedback. Daily home practice was encouraged and monitored to measure the effects on blood pressure and GSR at the end of the 1(st), 2(nd), and 3(rd) month of intervention. RESULTS: The study group participants showed significant decrease in mean (SD) systolic [140.77 (8.31) to 136.93 (7.96), F = 469.08] and diastolic blood pressure [88.24 (5.42) to 85.77 (4.66), F = 208.21]. In contrast, control group participants had a mild increase in the mean systolic (F = 6.02) and diastolic blood pressure (F = 4.70) values from pretest to posttests. GSR showed a significant increase from 559.63 (226.33) to 615.03 (232.24), (F = 80.21) from pretest to posttest III. CONCLUSIONS: Use of home-based biofeedback-centered behavioral interventions enabled BP reduction among hypertensive patients. Further studies should use biochemical markers of sympathetic nervous system activity to endorse this home-based chronic illness intervention.