Acupressure in Decreasing Treatment-Related Symptoms in Childhood Cancer Patients

PRIMARY OBJECTIVES:

I. To assess the feasibility of an acupressure intervention plus usual care and to assess the benefits and risks compared to usual care alone for children receiving hospital-based treatment for a childhood cancer or hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT).

II. To assess the benefits and challenges of providing the acupressure intervention for parents.

ADDITIONAL QUALITY OBJECTIVES:

I. To explore the child’s experience of receiving acupressure and the caregiver’s experience of delivering acupressure to the child through a semi-structured interview with the caregiver, with a focus on well-being.

II. To explore the acupressure provider’s impression of how provider- or caregiver-delivered acupressure impacts the child’s experience of childhood cancer treatment or HSCT.

OUTLINE: Patients are randomized into 1 of 2 arms.

ARM A: Patients receive ~20 acupressure treatments (avg 15-20 minutes each) 5-7 days per week over 1 month of continuous hospital-based treatment or over 2 months of intermittent hospital-based treatment and usual care for symptom management.

ARM B: Patients receive usual care for symptom management.

After completion of study, patients are followed up within 30 days.