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ABSTRACT: Introduction & Objective: Breast cancer is one of the most prevalent cancers among the women with annual growth of 2 percent. It affects grossly the patient's quality of life. Rehabilitation can be so effective on physiopsychosocical health and finally increases their quality of life recovery. This study was designed to determine the effects of rehabilitation on quality of life in women after mastectomy. Materials & Methods: In a clinical trial, 57 cancerous women who underwent modified radical mastectomy, had finished chemotherapy and radiotherapy and received hormone therapy were selected and randomly placed in two case and control groups. Control group was under medical care and the case group in addition to medical care received rehabilitation (physiotherapy, education, individual counseling) for 2 months. The quality of life, with regard to breast cancer, was measured by EORTC QLQ-BR 23, before Intervention, 1 week and 3 months after rehabilitation in both groups. Data analysis was done by chi square, fisher exact test, t- and paired t-tests and repeated measurement test. Results: There was a statistically significant decrease in body image and future perspective and meaningful increase in sexual enjoyment and arm symptom in case group compared to control group before intervention, while no significant difference was seen in other scales before intervention. One week after the interference, differences of both group in two scales of sex function and sex enjoyment were meaningful and the function of case group was more undesirable then that of the control group. Three months after completing the process there was a meaningful decrease in sex function and sex enjoyment in case group in comparison with the control group but there was a significant recovery in the case group in other performance scales. Systemic therapy side effects were significantly decreased in case group 3 months after intervention whereas the quality of life in control group decreased or did not change significantly after 3 months. Conclusion: Performing rehabilitation process including education, individual counseling and physiotherapy can promote the Q.O.L of patients with mastectomy therefore rehabilitation can be recommended as an effective care program.

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Introduction & Objective: The effect of touch on the growth of newborns has been achieved by educated staff, but touch therapy by mothers, as the most important care provider for their infants, has not been focused in previous studies. Materials & Methods: In this randomized controlled trail and double blind study which was conducted at Tehran University of Medical Sciences in 2010, 60 preterm newborns, which were discharged from neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) , were randomly allocated to a control and a touch therapy group (30 newborns in each group). Touch therapy was directly instructed to the mother, also offering guide booklets to the mother. Touch was provided by mother for three periods, 20 minutes each, per day, until term corrected age. In two groups, neonate weight by the electronic weighing scale with an accuracy of ± 10 grams, height with an infant meter, also head and chest circumference with a non-stretchable cloth-tape were measured at the time of discharge following the term corrected age. The statistical data was analyzed by the SPSS software using Kolmogrov Smirnov, Mann-Whitney, Chi-square, Independent T-test and Fisher test. Results: The mean age, type of delivery, level of education, employment and socio-economic status in mothers of the two groups, also weight, sex and other neonate characteristics had no statistical differences. At the term corrected age, there were no differences in mean of height, head and chest circumference between two groups, but the interventional group showed an average weight gain more than the control group, (3373± 270.3 , 2905± 372.6 gr) which was statistically significant (p=0.04). It means that neonates in intervention group gained 468 grams more than the control group. Conclusion: Between all anthropometric measurements, only weight was affected by touch therapy. This might be due to the speed of weight gaining compared to increase in height, head and chest circumference.