Effectiveness of aromatherapy in reducing duration of labour: a systematic review

Childbirth is one of the most important events in woman's life. Different methods are typically used for labour augmentation. Aromatherapy is one of the complementary methods. The present systematic review evaluated the efficacy of aromatherapy in reducing the duration of labour. A systematic search of all clinical trials studies on Cochrane, Scopus, Web of Science, PubMed, ProQuest, Google scholar, Irandoc, Science direct, Magiran and Sid was performed up to September 2021. A total of 22 articles met the inclusion criteria and 3234 women used a variety of aromatherapies. Results showed that some aromatherapies, such as lavender was almost effective in reducing length of labour. Results suggest that some aromatherapy can be an effective, inexpensive and holistic method of reducing the duration of labour but it should be used with caution.