Evidence map›Paper›PMID 26587391›Full record

ReviewJournal of traditional and complementary medicine2015

Revisiting reflexology: Concept, evidence, current practice, and practitioner training.

Nurul Haswani Embong, Yee Chang Soh, Long Chiau Ming, Tin Wui Wong

Registry-linked trialAbstract readReview
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Review in Journal of traditional and complementary medicine, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT03939611 (The Effect of Foot Reflexology on Infantile Colic Symptoms), which is not on this map. Cited by 28 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
28citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

NCT03939611 nacompletednot on this mapstarted 2016, after this paper: background citation

The Effect of Foot Reflexology on Infantile Colic Symptoms: Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Trial

TypeinterventionalSponsorAkdeniz UniversityRan2016 to 2017Enrolled45ConditionsInfantile Colic, ReflexologyArmsFoot Reflexology, Placebo Foot Reflexology
3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

28 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Trial
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  7. Review
  8. Article
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  12. Foot Reflexology: Recent Research Trends and Prospects.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022
    Review
  13. Review
  14. The Effects of Foot Reflexology on Vital Signs: A Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.Evidence-based complementary and alternative medicine : eCAM · 2022
    Article
  15. Article
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Nurul Haswani EmbongFaculty of Pharmacy, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Puncak Alam, Selangor, Malaysia.
Yee Chang SohFaculty of Pharmacy, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Puncak Alam, Selangor, Malaysia.
Long Chiau MingFaculty of Pharmacy, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Puncak Alam, Selangor, Malaysia ; Brain Degeneration and Therapeutics Group, Pharmaceutical and Life Sciences CoRe, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia.
Tin Wui WongNon-Destructive Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Research Centre, iPROMISE, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Puncak Alam, Selangor, Malaysia.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Reflexology is basically a study of how one part of the human body relates to another part of the body. Reflexology practitioners rely on the reflexes map of the feet and hands to all the internal organs and other human body parts. They believe that by applying the appropriate pressure and massage certain spots on the feet and hands, all other body parts could be energized and rejuvenated. This review aimed to revisit the concept of reflexology and examine its effectiveness, practices, and the training for reflexology practitioners. PubMed, SCOPUS, Google Scholar, and SpringerLink databases were utilized to search the following medical subject headings or keywords: foot massage, reflexology, foot reflexotherapy, reflexological treatment, and zone therapy. The articles published for the last 10 years were included. Previous systematic reviews failed to show concrete evidence for any specific effect of reflexology in any conditions. Due to its non-invasive, non-pharmacological complementary nature, reflexology is widely accepted and anecdotal evidence of positive effect reflexology in a variety of health conditions are available. Adequate training for practitioners is necessary to ensure the consistency of service provided.

Indexed as

Complementary and alternative medicineFoot massage reflexologyPain managementTreatment effectZone therapy

Identifiers

PMID26587391
PMCPMC4624523

What OpenQuestion holds

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LicenceCC BY-NC-ND
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Registered trials

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.