The Effect of Music Therapy and Progressive Muscle Relaxation Exercise on Anxiety Before the First Clinical Practice in Nursing Students: A Randomized Controlled Study

Abstract

AIM: This study was carried out to evaluate the effect of music therapy and progressive muscle relaxation exercise on the state and traitanxiety levels before their first clinical practice in nursing students.METHOD: This randomized controlled experimental study sample consisted of 86 nursing students who will be firstly applied to clinicalpractice. The students were randomly assigned to music (n=30), exercise (n=28), and control (n=28) groups. The data of the studywere collected with Student Information Form and State-Trait Anxiety Scale. The music therapy intervention was applied to the musicgroup three times a week for the first 2 weeks. Progressive muscle relaxation exercise was applied alone to the exercise group threetimes a week for the first 2 weeks in a separate room. No intervention was applied to the control group. This study RCT number is:NCT04540172RESULTS: The majority of the students was female (81.4%), and the mean age was 19.74±1.38 years. After the interventions, therewas a statistical difference between the groups, and this difference was created by the control group (p